


The One Who Stole From A Witch's Garden

by Candied_Fruit, Destinies Entwined (Candied_Fruit)



Category: To The Edge of the Sky (Visual Novel), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Ashrays, Attempted Rape, BTS – Side characters, Centaurs, Dark Faeries, Death, Enzo Kang (Operative Four) as The Witch, Execution, F/M, Faeries - Freeform, Fairies, Fluff, Folklore, Forbidden Forests, Gore, Hansel and Gretel Elements, I have ships as well, I think yall will like this, Inspired by Maleficent (2014), It has a happy ending I swear, It starts off with Zero romance but it was actually Four romance all along, Jeon Jae-Ho (Operative Zero) as The One Who Stole From A Witch's Garden, Jeon Jungkook (BTS Jungkook) as The Cousin, Jung Hoseok (J-Hope) as the Tortured Soul, Jung Rèmy (Operative Six) as The Dark Faerie, Kim Nabi (Operative Nine) as The Werewolf, Kim Namjoon (BTS RM) as The Informer, Kim Seokjin (BTS Jin) as The Protector, Kim Taehyung (BTS V) as Death/Grim Reaper, Ko Daehyeon (Operative Five) as The Pied Piper, Ko Jae-Jin (Operative Three) as The Oracle, Legends, M/M, Magic, Magical Realms, Min Yoongi (BTS Suga) as The Witch's Brother, Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children Elements, Multi, Mythology - Freeform, Not set in PHASe, Other Worlds, Park Jimin (BTS Jimin) as The Siren's Brother, Park Taehyun (Operative Eight) as The Siren, Pied Piper - Freeform, Pixies, Psychological Trauma, Rapunzel Elements, Reincarnation, Remy X Jimin, Romance, Self-Harm, Sirens, Snow White Elements, Suicide, TTEOTS, TTEOTS (new characters), TTEOTS – Main characters, There's a clue, Torture, Werewolves, Witches, Zero X Nine, cursed mirrors, enchanted forests, extra tags for who plays who, five x eight, long chapters, myths, please read the tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:01:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 38,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29907720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Candied_Fruit/pseuds/Candied_Fruit, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Candied_Fruit/pseuds/Destinies%20Entwined
Summary: "Demons are like obedient dogs. They come when they are called..." The witch stops with a wicked smile. "And I was called just like the rest."Nobody goes into the Forbidden Forest. No matter what. Nobody goes into the forest where magic leaks like a tap that will never close. Nobody goes where the witch lives. And nobody comes out alive if they do.But Jae-Ho had no choice to venture into that wretched forest. He had no choice but to steal from his garden. He had no choice in anything at all. And he had no idea how far the consequences would go."Hate in return for love, great pain in return for great health, sorrows in return for eternal joy, death in return for a life, sacrifice in return for power. I do all this, just for you. So tell me dearest Jae-Ho, how am I cruel when I give you what you want?"TTEOTS new characters | BTS (South Korean Boy Group)





	1. Jeon Jae-Ho and Midnight Starwind

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! (✿❦ ͜ʖ ❦)
> 
> This is your favourite author here – Raven! How've you been doing? Good? That's awesome! If you're not doing good, you can come talk to me on my Wattpad: [@SugasAbandonedBogey](https://www.wattpad.com/user/SugasAbandonedBogey)! »-(¯`·.·´¯)->Because I love all of you<-(¯`·.·´¯)-« So, let's get into this, and let me explain somethings. I'd highly recommend clicking [here](https://www.wattpad.com/myworks/247693096/write/984392639) for an A/N that explains everything much more in-depth, but let's get this bread! So, first of all, TTEOTS are the main characters, not BTS. As someone who very much prefers the new faces of TTEOTS and has been in the fandom for a long time (almost three years!) I get sad (ᗒᗣᗕ)՞ and confused (⊙_◎) when I see the lack of fanfiction... So, my evil ass wanted to make one of my own that isn't set in PHASe but entirely a new universe! I'll also be coming out with a lot of TTEOTS fanfiction (✾♛‿♛), and if you'd like to make a request... PM me on Wattpad about it.
> 
> 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒: (Main)
> 
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝙵𝚘𝚞𝚛 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚆𝚒𝚝𝚌𝚑 | 𝚅𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚎𝚗𝚣𝚘 𝙺𝚊𝚗𝚐  
> ➜ "ʜᴏᴡ ᴀᴍ ɪ ᴄʀᴜᴇʟ ᴡʜᴇɴ ɪ ɢɪᴠᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴀɴᴛ?"  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝚂𝚒𝚡 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙳𝚊𝚛𝚔 𝙵𝚊𝚎𝚛𝚒𝚎 | 𝙹𝚞𝚗𝚐 𝚁𝚎𝚖𝚢  
> ➜ "ɪ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ᴇᴠɪʟ ᴏɴ ᴍʏ ᴡɪɴɢꜱ ᴀɴᴅ ɪ ꜰʟʏ ᴀʟʟ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ"  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝙽𝚒𝚗𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙲𝚞𝚛𝚜𝚎𝚍 𝚆𝚎𝚛𝚎𝚠𝚘𝚕𝚏 | 𝙺𝚒𝚖 𝙽𝚊𝚋𝚒  
> ➜ "ꜱᴏᴍᴇᴛɪᴍᴇꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴏᴏɴ ɪꜱ ʜᴏᴡʟɪɴɢ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʟᴠᴇꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ꜱɪʟᴇɴᴛ."  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝙴𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚂𝚒𝚛𝚎𝚗 | 𝙿𝚊𝚛𝚔 𝚃𝚊𝚎𝚑𝚢𝚞𝚗-𝙰𝚕𝚎𝚓𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚛𝚘  
> ➜ "ᴍᴀɢɪᴄ ꜱᴘᴇᴀᴋꜱ. ᴍᴀɢɪᴄ ᴋɴᴏᴡꜱ. ɪ ᴄᴀɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ʏᴏᴜ ɴᴏᴛʜɪɴɢ."  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝙵𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙿𝚒𝚎𝚍 𝙿𝚒𝚙𝚎𝚛 | 𝙺𝚘 𝙳𝚊𝚎𝚑𝚢𝚎𝚘𝚗  
> ➜ "ꜰᴇᴀʀ ʜᴀꜱ ᴀ ʟᴀʀɢᴇ ꜱʜᴀᴅᴏᴡ ʙᴜᴛ ʜᴇ ʜɪᴍꜱᴇʟꜰ ɪꜱ ꜱᴍᴀʟʟ."  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝚉𝚎𝚛𝚘 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙾𝚗𝚎 𝚆𝚑𝚘 𝚂𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚎 𝙵𝚛𝚘𝚖 𝙰 𝚆𝚒𝚝𝚌𝚑'𝚜 𝙶𝚊𝚛𝚍𝚎𝚗 | 𝙹𝚎𝚘𝚗 𝙹𝚊𝚎-𝙷𝚘  
> ➜ "ɪᴛ'ꜱ ᴀʟᴡᴀʏꜱ ʙᴇᴇɴ ʏᴏᴜ ᴀɴᴅ ᴍᴇ. ᴀʟᴡᴀʏꜱ ʜᴀꜱ ʙᴇᴇɴ. ᴀʟᴡᴀʏꜱ ᴡɪʟʟ ʙᴇ."  
> 𝚃𝚃𝙴𝙾𝚃𝚂 𝙾𝚙𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚟𝚎 𝚃𝚑𝚛𝚎𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝙾𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚕𝚎 | 𝙺𝚘 𝙹𝚊𝚎-𝙹𝚒𝚗  
> ➜ "ʟᴏᴏᴋ ᴡʜᴏꜱᴇ ʙᴀᴄᴋ!"
> 
> I'll also be dropping the soundtracks I listened to while writing each chapter as well! (⁄ ⁄◕⁄‿⁄◕⁄ ⁄✿)  
> For example, if I listened to Imagine Dragons 'Believer' and ATEEZ 'Inception', I would link it for you guys, too!  
> By the way, everytime a new creature pops up in a chapter, I'll leave a description of what they are or a link to explain!
> 
> Happy readings! (〜^∇^)〜  
> ╰( ^o^)╮╰( ^o^)╮

**Prologue : Jeon Jae-Ho and Midnight Starwind**

_He remembers loving the girl to this very day._

_그는 오늘까지 소녀를 사랑했던 것을 기억합니다._

**THE FORBIDDEN FOREST**... Every story, every rumour, every legend surrounding that place makes Jae-Ho's blood curdle and gut twist painfully. His blood simmers in spite, his brain stews in raw disgust and even his bones smoulder in pain.

The forest itself is absolutely stunning, sublime in everyway imaginable. The forest has huge trees, its bark pleasantly ancient and divine, a marble-lead-gold, shining like the buttermilk moon itself; reminding Jae-Ho of silent sentinels as he walks past them everyday. Every vein and twirling dance of peppermint and beryl-green leaves, fluttering down onto autumn-brown soil, made Jae-Ho's heart twist painfully. Lances and chords of supernal, aureate light came shining down through the dewy foliage. And Jae-Ho despised the candied aroma of the flowers that shot vibrant and pleasant colours through the forest, hated the fragrant caramel smell.

The forest comes to life with the ancient alchemy of an avian ara, the animals thrumming the forest to life, a dawning chorus of melodic birdsongs and rhythmic chirruping; a quavering orchestra, a winged symphony. And when Jae-Ho had peered in with Midnight when he was younger, he had seen all the animals that lurked inside: turbo-winged blackbirds, star-blazed foals and misty-eyed fox cubs. And those very same animals watch the passerby's with something cruel glinting in those ochre-orange eyes, ready to cajole in the next victim inside, never to return.

And Jae-Ho hated it especially at night. Living so near the Forbidden Forest didn't make his life any more comforting, and when he looked outside at night-time; ocean-blue eyes doe-wide and curious, he finds himself petrified by the warping, abnormal shapes of the forest, the trees sticking out like serrated canines from the ground. But then it's morning and the trees are all glimmering goldens, plum purples and wine-reds. Then the forest is deceivingly beautiful.

Jae-Ho scowls as he sits by the window, glowering at the forest, his full lips curving downwards in distaste as he remembers the little incident that had happened when he was younger. He remembers being twelve-years-old, walking past the forest to reach the village and shopping market. He remembers Midnight; with her flowing, raven-black hair holding his hand. He remembers letting go of her hand for a moment to fix his shoes. He remembers turning around and not seeing her there beside him.

He remembers the panic to not see her there, standing beside him, smiling that bedazzling smile. He remembers the unmixed fear he felt looking at her standing too deep into the forest. He remembers how petrified he felt seeing her look around in wonder and laugh at absolutely nothing. He remembers stumbling inside and roaring her name at the top of his lungs. He remembers grabbing her hand and yanking her backwards. He remembers her eyes, they were glittering an orange-amber colour; not her usual glistening storm of molten emerald. He remembers shouting at her for going inside.

He knows who had captivated her enough, it had been The Pied Piper – one of the most... famous people in the forest. Known to sing and dance for eternity, playing tunes on a pipe that are (and will always stay) unheard and hypnotising. Singing songs so sorrowful and spine-chilling that anybody who listens is instantly entranced, haunting and sensual.

Now, everytime they pass the forest. Jae-Ho clutched onto Midnight's hand, his grip - tight and unyielding. The fear of losing her, stronger than ever, every single time they walked past that cursed forest. 

Losing Midnight is truly most scariest thing he could every think of, losing the very love of his life is what would murder him on the inside. But do you know what the second scariest thing is? The witch. The Wicked Witch of The East: a man with magic so powerful and strong and dangerous that a million generations of doctors were nothing compared to him and his knowledge. A whole world of the most skilled warriors would be absolutely annihilated with a simple flick of his wrist.

Nobody had seen him. If anyone has, they were most likely dead.  
If anyone has, they were most likely dead.  
They were most likely dead.  
Most likely dead.

Some say he can bend the cosmos to his will.  
Some say he harnesses the powers of Hell.  
Some say he comes from Hell itself.  
Some say he's the devil's best friend.  
Some say he's everything dreaded and cursed.

Either way, Jae-Ho loathes the very idea of the witch.

Either way, the forest is off-limits. Forbidden. You're running out of meat, you go to the Western forest not the Eastern. You're running low on firewood, go to the Western forest not the Eastern. You need herbs and medicine, go to the Western forest not the Eastern.

Never the Eastern. Ever.

Ever.

Jae-Ho is quite fond of the Western Forest, however.

He works there, and it's also where he met Midnight. He remembers that memory, too, clear as crystal.

He remembers being a young boy of eight, finding a beautiful seven-year-old girl abandoned and lost. He remembers taking her hands and taking her to his home, dubbing her 'Gem' because of those gem-like eyes. He remembers his mother instantly accepting the little girl into their family. He remembers her teaching him how to braid hair, he remembers entwining flowers to her knee-length, curly hair. He remembers playing and talking to the girl the very minute she stepped foot in the house.

He remembers loving the girl to this very day.

And right now, with the girl, he gets ready for another trip to the forest. He wears his hunting suit, consisting of black leather and cotton, and slips on a pair of heavy boots. He smiles fondly as he watches her struggle to fasten the red cloak she wears, he watches her as she fiddles and fumbles with the profane-black button.

"Do you need help?" he asks, dulcet and rich voice carrying its way across the comforting silence of their home.

"No, I'm–" The button snaps, rolling across the cold floor, and Midnight pokes the inside of her cheek in anger. "Absolutely fine," she finishes.

Jae-Ho laughs, the way an evil child would – cute, youthful and refreshing. And watches her as she simply decides to wear her black cloak, fastening the golden thread with simplistic ease. She sits beside Jae-Ho, watching him tie up the laces of his boots. She places her chin on his shoulder and traces the line of his jaw, and she speaks to him, "Jae-Ho, will you take me to the flowery bit in the forest? You promised."

"Yeah, I'll take you," he promises, looking at her, noses so incredibly close. He smiles – wide and charming, his lip ring glinting, and his eyes glimmer looking at her. He quickly shakes off those feelings and pulls her upwards. "But, it's probably not got any flowers in it."

"Why not?" she asks him, taking his hand as they walk outside, hunting bag heaved on Jae-Ho's shoulders.

"Because," he sings playfully. "Because it's..." He looks at her expectantly but when Midnight simply looks at him blankly, he exclaims with a ferocious anger, "Change of seasons, you idiot! How dumb are you?"

"That hurts my feelings," she says with mock hurt, placing a hand on her heart. She smiles, outstretching her cerise-pink lips to showcase sparkling, archangel-white teeth.

"Why would I care?" he says, walking ahead but Midnight easily catches up to him.

"You care because you love me!" she hollers, pointing finger-guns at him. _If you knew how true that is_ , he thinks to himself and rolls his eyes at her childish antics. "Is it possible to identify as an–"

"Idiot? Yes, yes it is. You're a perfect example of that." Jae-Ho looks seemingly proud of himself and Midnight rolls her eyes, pursing her lips and squinting her eyes.

She nudges his shoulder and points at something, and Jae-Ho finds himself looking at... a squirrel. The squirrel glares at them with rodent eyes. "That's the squirrel I told you about," Midnight mumbles to him.

"The one that you saw throw another squirrel into a river?" he asks in confusion, eyes widening adorably.

"Yup, I have called her... Johniffer."

Everything had been fine.

Hunting in the Western forest.

Laughing until they were about to throw up.

Cloud-gazing early in the mornings.

Everything was fine until Midnight got sick.

**And that, my friend, is where the story truly begins~**

Also, here are the character banners:

 **TTEOTS Operative Four** as The Witch | Vincenzo Kang

**TTEOTS Operative Six** as The Dark Faerie | Jung Remy

**TTEOTS Operative Nine** as The Cursed Werewolf | Kim Nabi

**TTEOTS Operative Eight** as The Siren | Park Taehyun-Alejandro

**TTEOTS Operative Five** as The Pied Piper | Ko Daehyeon

**TTEOTS Operative Zero** as The One Who Stole From A Witch's Garden | Jeon Jae-Ho

**TTEOTS Operative Three** as The Oracle | Ko Jae-Jin

**BTS Jin** as The Protector | Kim Seokjin

**BTS V** as Death | Kim Taehyung

**BTS Jungkook** as The Cousin | Jeon Jungkook

**BTS Jimin** as The Siren's Brother | Park Jimin

**BTS Suga** as The Witch's Brother | Kang-Min Yoongi

**BTS J-Hope** as The Tortured Soul | Jung Hoseok

**BTS RM** as The Informer | Kim Namjoon

**Midnight-Celestin Starwind** (no face claim)


	2. The One Who Stole From A Witch's Garden

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nobody goes into the forest.
> 
> Nobody steals from the witch's garden.
> 
> But he needs that medicine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello~! Ψ(☆ｗ☆)Ψ
> 
> You stayed for the second chapter? Yay! ▼(´ᴥ`)▼ That's awesome! Thanks a bunch, please do tell me if you enjoyed it! Okay, so here is what I listened to whilst writing this, whoop-whoop! I'm really excited y'all! What about you guys? You doing well? Also, whose your TTEOTS bias? Mine's is Four, our beloved Wraith!
> 
> ♪♪＼(^ω^＼)( /^ω^)/♪♪ [Sia – The Greatest ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKSRyLdjsPA)  
> ♪♪＼(^ω^＼)( /^ω^)/♪♪ [Imagine Dragons – Bad Liar](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQAYb9ok4s0)  
> ♪♪＼(^ω^＼)( /^ω^)/♪♪ [J-Hope – Boy Meets Evil (Instrumental) ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCPM5u6T9ec)[ ♪♪＼(^ω^＼)( /^ω^)/♪♪ ]()[Lost Within – A Himitsu ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WQjgHuUDWU)
> 
> So, I hope you enjoy the chapter, dear friend! Also, the [witch's cottage](https://www.google.com/search?safe=strict&sa=G&hl=en_US&tbs=simg:CAQSiAIJyqFIIUhrzFwa_1AELELCMpwgaOgo4CAQSFMUurCfTLsAbrB2RFaMDpyjUMeEXGhoD7etTyTy7S-mBVhMZMNyffHP7q8bcfXLt3iAFMAQMCxCOrv4IGgoKCAgBEgSfAMOgDAsQne3BCRqcAQobCglmaW5lIGFydHPapYj2AwoKCC9tLzBtZzF3Ch0KCnN0aWxsIGxpZmXapYj2AwsKCS9tLzAxc3B6cwoXCgR5YXJk2qWI9gMLCgkvbS8wNDlfM3YKHQoKaG9sbHlob2Nrc9qliPYDCwoJL20vMDJ6aG43CiYKE3dhdGVyY29sb3IgcGFpbnRpbmfapYj2AwsKCS9tLzAxOGt0cAw&q=beautiful+paintings+of+life&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiVyrXLmZ_vAhUChlwKHQQaDUsQwg4oAHoECAUQMA&biw=1365&bih=580#imgrc=qRZPuJdHSdE5OM).
> 
> Oh! Also, I'd like to address the chapters quickly, especially for the ARMY who want to know in which chapters do BTS appear!
> 
> I don't have a proper plan, but here's a brief outline!  
> {1} In chapters 1-10 (it could be a lil less or a lil more), we see the journey of the witch, Midnight and Jae-Ho, we also get quite a few character appearances from Remy (Six), Nabi (Nine), Taehyun (Eight) and Daehyeon! We have a brief appearance of Yoongi alongside many mentions, a mention of Hoseok and a brief appearance, a mention and brief appearance of Jimin, a big appearance of Seokjin and Taehyung, and a mention of Namjoon.  
> {2} In the chapters after that we will explore the story of The Pied Piper and The Siren, where we get another appearance of Yoongi, a mention of Hoseok, an appearance or mention of all TTEOTS members, a major appearance of Jimin.
> 
> I can't spoil it further!

**Chapter One: The One Who Stole From The Witch - Part 1**

_"I'll protect you from this entire world and everything in it."_

_"나는이 세상과 그 안에있는 모든 것으로부터 당신을 보호 할 것입니다."_

**JAE-HO'S THROAT TIGHTENS** and his lips quiver, he finds himself biting the inside of his cheek until the metallic zing of blood flows down a hot throat, and he refuses to let those dreadful tears fall out of his stinging eyes.

He holds a bag in his hands, filled to very brim with tisanes and elixirs and medicines. He wipes away those wretches tear-stains on his face, he wipes them away and replaces them with a grin – huge and adorable. He enters the house, pushing open the door, dropping the bags to the floor, and he calls out the name of his friend.

"Midnight~ Gemmie~ I'm home~" Jae-Ho sing-songs, and he frowns when he hears no reply.

He walks over and he sees Midnight sleeping, a sheen of fever-sweat covering her skin and dampening her hair. He's just about to leave when he sees her crack her eyes open, glittering emerald eyes meet his, and then a weak smile appears on her lips.

"Hey," she croaks out weakly. "You're..." A gasp for breath. "You're back, Blue."

Jae-Ho can almost feel himself break, _almost_.

"Yeah... Yeah, I'm back. How've you been?" Jae-Ho asks, coming closer to her bed and sitting down on the floor, right beside her. He finds himself stroking her hair and leaving trails of kisses on her hands.

"Sleep- Sleepy, same old-" A violent cough. "Ouch, the hell is wrong with me today?" She smiles. "Well, you seem..." She furrows her brows and suddenly her features soften and become gentle as she looks at him in concern. "You seem sad, why you sad, Blue?"

"I'm not sad. Just worried. Just worried is all," Jae-Ho lies through gritted teeth.

Midnight reaches up a hand, caressing Jae-Ho's face with a feather-light touch, her hand trembling from the effort to do so. Jae-Ho presses her hand more against his cheek.

Midnight laughs, a cheerful sound.

"Don't worry, one... One day I'll get better and then..." She looks at Jae-Ho who holds her hand with both his own, caressing it with his thumbs. "Then I'll slap you."

"I'll let you."

 _I'd let you slap me a million times if it meant you'd survive,_ Jae-Ho's thoughts go unheard by Midnight. Midnight's eyes wonder about, and she smiles at something far off while humming an unknown tune.

Jae-Ho pulls out a glass vial of magenta-coloured liquid, and Jae-Ho can only imagin the rotten, ill-tasting contents that Midnight is already dramatically gagging at, and then she suddenly goes limp, head lolling backwards – playing dead.

"Midnight, stop playing dead. I'll still shove the elixir down your throat."

Midnight opens her eyes and squints them at Jae-Ho. "You're no fun broski, no fun at all."

"Yeah, I know. Now shut up and take it."

Jae-Ho begins to spoon the elixir into her mouth and he grins at Midnight's disgusted expression, she makes a gagging sound but Jae-Ho simply shoves the elixir into her mouth so that she actually does gag on it, and Jae-Ho snickers.

"Jae-Ho, you little-" Midnight stops and smiles as she looks outside the window. "They're really loud today."

"What's loud?"

"The... The faeries..." Jae-Ho frowns at the answer, and she says, "Can't you hear them?"

Hearing things, seeing things that weren't there was happening too often now, all because the doctor wouldn't tell Jae-Ho the correct medicines she needs until today, too busy leeching off of the little money he had left.

"No, I can- I can hear them. The song is... I hate it," he says, leaning

Midnight smiles, relief decorating her face. Relief that he can hear it, too.

"Thank you, Jae-Ho," Midnight says from out of the blue.

"Huh?"

"For everything." Midnight smiles sadly, she holds his hand, laughing silently to herself as she realises Jae-Ho's hand is much bigger than her own. "If I die-"

"You're not going to die." Jae-Ho says fiercely, his innocent eyes burning at the very thought. "I won't let you. You won't leave me."

"Jae-Ho, we have to face it I might-"

"You won't."

"I might-"

"I won't let it happen."

Midnight simply smiles again. "But let's just say I do-"

"No. You won't die. The doctor said so."

(Liar.)

 _"Sorry, son,"_ the doctor's voice echoes in his head. " _Had I known sooner what she needed, I would've bought them for you myself."_ Liar, he knew what she had needed, but he also wanted money, and Jae-Ho had given it to him in despair. " _You need Fire Cider, all the ingredients you need for that are at the market but that's four days from where you live. And you won't leave Midnight alone for that long, will you? And you need..."_ The doctor had went on, listing everything Jae-Ho needed and Jae-Ho had wanted to punch the doctor. _"It'll be surprise if she lasts another two months, I'm sorry."_

"You won't die," he whispers, and envelopes her in his arms, planting kisses on her hair.

Tears blur his vision and he almost breaks as he feels Midnight's hand soothingly running up and down his back. He feels a kiss placed on his jaw and it lingers there for awhile.

Midnight doesn't deserve this. She doesn't deserve any of it.

She doesn't deserve this wretched sickness. She doesn't deserve it at all.

She's a good friend, a good person, a good everything.

Everybody knows that.

She's a good person who could brighten up anyone's day and would stay with you until she knew you were okay, whether she liked you or not. She'd set herself on fire just to make someone laugh. She'd never judge you, only understand you. Jae-Ho's entire life revolves around her, every memory has Midnight etched onto it somehow.

She has a hilarious laugh that sounds like a wiper that instantly brightens Jae-Ho's day. She tells stupid jokes that make no sense that usually have them both crying on the ground. She gives him thousands of warm and loving hugs and makes him feel special, and she helps the days she can walk even a few steps.

She was Jae-Ho's 'okay' and seeing his okay not okay hurt him. It hurt him a lot.

That's why he worked day and night without Midnight, and it was much harder trying to hunt enough animals to sell all alone. His arms and his body ache with a constant, thundering pain and Jae-Ho tries his best not to let his exhaustion show.

Because he knows that it would hurt her even more knowing he's in pain as he works for the two of them. It would hurt her even more, and seeing her hurt would only make him hurt more.

It hurt seeing her energetic aura slowly fading away as unnatural sleep always consumed her. It hurt seeing her honey-golden skin pale down to odd grey and green colours that made her look like a dead person. It hurt seeing her once-fuschia lips curve downwards in pain and agony as she tries to sit herself up. It hurt seeing the muscle in her body fade away into frail, weak bones. It hurt when her rattling, wet coughs shook the entire house in fever and sickness. It hurt seeing her cry over knowing she was beginning to lose herself.

And it hurt, knowing he could do almost nothing about it.

(Almost.)

Jae-Ho remembers the one time he had gotten sick, Midnight had done everything, that's why does everything too.

Jae-Ho nuzzles her sweaty hair and pulls her closer. He whispers to himself a silent promise he'll never break: _I'll protect you from this entire world and everything in it, even if it means I'll be the one dead. Even if it means you'll hate me. Even if you forget me. I'll protect you. I promise._

And Jae-Ho ignores the quiet, nagging voice in his head that sneers and scathes at him. He ignores the voice that is like venomous, icy metal dripping at the back of his mind, unignorable.

_You know, the pantry would be full should the sickbed be empty._

_You know Midnight can't swim, you know how easy it would be to gather her up and drop her into the river_. _Poor girl can barely survive against the cold._

It's during those times when the voice comes back, he sobs silently and begs for Midnight to forgive him.

 _"Gemmie, forgive me, please,"_ he had once whispered to her as she slept in his arms, after having a nightmare of suffocating her with her own pillow whilst she slept.

Nobody goes into the forest.

Nobody steals from the witch's garden.

But he _needs_ that medicine.

**"I'll protect you from this entire world and everything in it, even if it means I'll be the one dead. Even if it means you'll hate me. Even if you forget me. I'll protect you. I promise." ~Jeon Jae-Ho's promise**

**But will he keep it?**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A FAIRY AND A FAERIE?  
>  Both fairy and faerie are used for two different mythical spirits or figures. "Fairy" is a word that has been derived from Latin word "fatum," which can mean "fate." Fairies are considered to be a group of young and pure spirits. ... Unlike the fairies, faeries are considered to be evil, horrid, and mischievous creatures.
> 
> WHAT IS A WEREWOLF?  
>  In folklore, a werewolf, or occasionally lycanthrope, is a human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf, either purposely or after being placed under a curse or affliction with the transformations occurring on the night of a full moon.
> 
> WHAT IS A WITCH? AND WHAT IS WITCHCRAFT?  
>  Witchcraft is the practice of magical skills, spells, and abilities. Witchcraft is a broad term that varies culturally and societally, and thus can be difficult to define with precision. And a witch is somebody who practises witchcraft.
> 
> [PIXIE](https://www.google.com/search?q=pixies+creature&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwihisWmmp_vAhUugM4BHSruDfgQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=pixies+&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQARgAMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgQIABBDMgIIAFDWAljWAmDkFGgAcAB4AIABrAKIAawCkgEDMy0xmAEAoAEBqgELZ3dzLXdpei1pbWfAAQE&sclient=img&ei=UVBFYOGdJa6Aur4Pqty3wA8&bih=580&biw=1365&rlz=1C5CHFA_enGB857GB857&safe=strict#imgrc=4gI4z4pK-EGpxM): A small, foot-tall creature that are usually gorgeous girls, you get different variations of them such as earth pixies, water pixies and so on. They are known to be friendly and sweet.
> 
> SIRENS: Sirens are almost always represented as voluptuous mermaids, whose beauty and sexuality lure men to their deaths. But the Classical Greeks understood the Sirens differently: as bird-women, creatures that Mediterranean cultures traditionally associated with hidden knowledge. In this story, sirens are depicted as charmers with a mermaid-appearance.
> 
> ASRAI: In English folklore the asrai is a type of aquatic fairy that lives in seas and lakes and is similar to the mermaid and nixie. They are sometimes described as timid and shy, standing between two and four feet tall, or may be depicted as tall and lithe.
> 
> KELPIE: A kelpie, or water kelpie, is a shape-shifting spirit inhabiting lakes in Scottish folklore. It is a Celtic legend; however, analogues exist in other cultures. It is usually described as a black horse-like creature, able to adopt human form.
> 
> [TREE WARRIORS](https://www.google.com/search?q=tree+warriors+maleficent&safe=strict&rlz=1C5CHFA_enGB857GB857&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=v-CANVriKulO3M%252CpUnC2Fd4CIo5YM%252C_&vet=1&usg=AI4_-kQeAiuORo7qdmHF-9LptgVQwR1b2Q&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi3sb2Om5_vAhXSQEEAHTLdDy8Q_h0wAHoECBMQAw&biw=1365&bih=580#imgrc=v-CANVriKulO3M): From the movie Malificent. Tree Warriors are an army of humanoid trees that inhabit the forest.
> 
> NYMPHS: A nymph in ancient Greek folklore is a minor female nature deity. Different from Greek goddesses, nymphs are generally regarded as personifications of nature. The Nymphs presided over various natural phenomena--from springs, to clouds, trees, caverns, meadows, and beaches. They were responsible for the care of the plants and animals of their domain.
> 
> [HOLLOWGAST](https://www.google.com/search?q=what+are+those+creature+from+miss+peregrines+home+for+peculiar+children&safe=strict&rlz=1C5CHFA_enGB857GB857&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjxm9bCm5_vAhUTh1wKHWG1BDEQ_AUoAXoECBgQAw&biw=1365&bih=580#imgrc=ZuP1uj0vtRUaYM): From Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Creatures. They are empty spirits created from the witch's darkest thoughts.
> 
> These are few of the creatures!


	3. The Witch's Garden, The Shadow On The Tree and The Witch's Gift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wolves howl. Birds chirrup. And Jae-Ho's terror makes his heart pound.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone! 
> 
> Did you enjoy the last chapter?✌.|•͡˘‿•͡˘|.✌ I hope you did! Also, I love the headcanons and AU's everyone is doing! Can anybody do one that's TTEOTS as your bestfriends? That's gotta be interesting!
> 
> Anyways, let's drop the tracks! ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> ٩(^ᴗ^)۶ [Cake Waltz – Jimin's Theme](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prDmNDv4QF4)  
> ٩(^ᴗ^)۶ [ ٩(^ᴗ^)۶ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbwNlbJAZJ8)[Beyond The Sky – Zero's Theme]()
> 
> I love the TTEOTS themes so much, they literally touch my soul with their sepulchre yet melodic tunes with such a melacholy meaning!༼☯﹏☯༽༼☯﹏☯༽༼☯﹏☯༽

**Chapter Two: The One Who Stole From The Witch - Part 2**

_"Do you not care about your friend?"_

_"당신은 당신의 친구를 신경 쓰지 않습니까?"_

**THOSE WHO COME** into the forest are begging to be killed; are begging to have themselves ripped apart; are begging to be lured far away; are begging to get lost. But, Jae-Ho _needs_ that medicine, and for Midnight, this was only the beginning of what he would do for her.

An oil lantern hangs from bronzed-golden fingers, and the vulpine-orange flame glowers at Jae-Ho for even considering such a foolish act. Jae-Ho enters the Forbidden Forest, his midnight-black cloak flowing behind him as he enters the dangerously bewitching forest.

Underneath the blood moon that hangs overhead, everything looks terrifying, as if the forest were angry, as if the very soul, the very core of the forest was angry. Everything is illuminating scarlet and vermillion, the very same colours of blood. The trees no longer stand tall and proud, they stand hunched and towering; monstrous and bladder-brown, almost decaying. The flowers had withered in the night, an augury of absolute doom, no longer sparkling like diamond flame. And Jae-Ho feels it, clawing at the back of his throat, sizzling in his mind. He feels the invisible eyes of every nightmare-inspiring thing on the very back of his head, boring into his rattling skull.

Jae-Ho sniffs blood in the air, the smell macabre and stomach-churning. He steps, quieter than a spider spinning silver web, and he hates the crunching of rocks and bones and twig underneath his feet. A marrow-freezing chill settles itself down Jae-Ho's spine as an agonised howl created a rift in the suffocating air, and Jae-Ho's breathing becomes ragged and laboured as he trudges for hours – lost.

Wolves howl. Birds chirrup. And Jae-Ho's terror makes his heart pound.

But then it goes silent, as if the slavering fangs of hot murder had suddenly silenced the forest. Nothing sounded, nothing stirred, nothing sang. And Jae-Ho finds himself gulping, and perhaps that's why a sudden leaf or limb creak, cracked and collapsed.

Jae-Ho is not terrified of the forest entirely. His job is to run around the dirtiest and scariest parts of the Western forest, so forests have never been scary to him the way they were other people. No, Jae-Ho is afraid of the witch figure everybody whispered about.

The most mysterious, the most enigmatic, the most powerful...

He gave the Pied Piper his magical flute; gave the Sirens an enchanting voice; blessed the mermaids with their shimmering tails; gave the centaurs their thundering hooves; gave the faeries their divine magic; gave the forest its soul-nourishing life.

The witch is said to have an intelligence that is unparallelled and a beauty unmatched, a beauty so terrifyingly surreal, a dangerous beauty – beautiful the way snowy-white corpses and jewel-white snow and scarlet blood is: miserably stunning.

They say he feasts on flesh and blood, the meat of children and adults. Not caring of your age, gender or looks. He simply just ate and ate, gluttonous and greedy to feed the fox inside himself, and Jae-Ho can imagine him: Starry-eyed as he rips apart a child's stomach, spreading a rippling heat everywhere as his tongue go slack with greed as he feasts on a fat heart.

With every anguishing and excruciating step, Jae-Ho thinks: Midnight – _step_ – Medicine – _step_ – Herbs – _step_ – Fire Cider – _step_ – Life.

Every breath is pulse-quickening and throat-constricting, and Jae-Ho can barely breathe as he walks for yet another hour, and he wonders if it's too late to run right back, but then pops up Midnight's face – glowing and healthy.

That's when Jae-Ho sees it.

A gash of moonstone-yellow through the thicket of trees, dazzling like an angel's halo, but more like a tangerin-epeach colour. And the abyss-black silhuoette of a chimneyed house, it comes through the trees as if through a veil of water.

Jae-Ho comes closer, not yet close enough to the house to notice any delicate details. And Jae-Ho feels...

How would you explain it? Fear? No... Something much bigger than fear, fear wasn't a good way to describe Jae-Ho's feelings right now. The word 'fear' is inferior to the amount of terror Jae-Ho feels doing this foolish act.

All he can hear is the thunderous howling of his mind to get out before it's too late, all he can feel is the hammering and painful jabs of his violent heart that seemed to want to rip through his chest. All he can see is blinding red red red red red _redredredredredredred_.

The ground is spinning. Singing. Dancing. _Screaming_.

Jae-Ho hears a whole choir of children singing, round and round him, they sing a song so ancient and so bloodcurdling that Jae-Ho clutches his ears.

(Do you hear them singing your name?) a voice seeps into his ears.

 _Jae-HoJae-HoJae-HoJae-HoJae-HoJae-Ho._ They keep chanting and singing like some unholy mantra.

(Do you hear them screaming, Jae-Ho?)

A loud, sinister screech is heard from miles away, and Jae-Ho feels his stomach churn and his bones rattle.

(Do you hear _him_ laughing, Jae-Ho?)

A laugh rings in the air, ringing with the same corrupt wickedness that is almost tangible from the forest. It comes from right inside that glowing cottage.

(Do you-)

"STOP!"

Jae-Ho clamps his hand over his mouth and sobs, falling down to the floor and crying silently. Oh god, he hopes the witch didn't hear, he hopes so badly that the witch didn't hear. Jae-Ho waits... and waits... and waits... and nothing... nothing happens.

Jae-Ho comes closer to the low stone wall that circles itself around the witch's garden, and a Eden-sweet smell cloys the air, smelling like burning, sugary roses and singed coconut calypso. He sees the huge oak tree that grows right outside the garden, the bark gnarling and decrepit yet so pleasantly sweet. Perhaps he should've looked more carefully where the branches were, then he would've seen the cloaked figure that held a pipe in his hands, watching Jae-Ho curiously.

(Look up, you fool!)

Jae-Ho doesn't.

(Look up!)

(Hurry!)

Jae-Ho doesn't admire the stunning garden whatsoever, he just jumps over the wall and lands with a dull thud, releasing a little whiny statement ( _"Ow~ I just hurt my head!"_ ) that he instantly regrets.

The window is large and the curtains cover whatever - _whoever_ \- lurks inside. A burnt orange glow burning the outside, and Jae-Ho is close enough to hear the whirring of a spinning wheel.

_Wrrrrrrr, wrrrrrrrr_

He doesn't care.

He uses the dim light to his advantage and paws his way to find the small daisy-like flowers of Chamomile; the dark purple berries of Elderberry; the scent of ginger for the Fire Cider. He rips through sticky milkweed that drips on his skin; grabs some garlic that tries to wade him off with its pungent scent; foxgloves seem to tinkle warningly telling him to run away before it's too late.

(Hurry!)

He claws through lavender, the blooms gentle on his face unlike his hands; hawthorn and nightshade are thrown to the side carelessly; the pretty-pink petals of Echinacea are tossed away with no admiration; Jae-Ho finds the Chamomile and the ginger.

(Hurry!)

He finds the Elderberry.

Then the Vervain.

(Hurry!)

Run.

His heart seizes for a moment, he's grabbing a cluster of flowers and stuffs them into his hunting bag until the brim overflows.

And then he runs.

Doesn't look back.

Never look back.

He wouldn't have wanted to see the figure jump down off the tree and turn to knock on the witch's door anyway.

"Can I come outside, too?" asks Midnight. "Like, could I sit in a chair and talk to you, please?"

Jae-Ho smiles and nods in answer, and he quickly cradles the girl into his arms and lifts her up with uncomfortable ease. She's too light, her curvy figure was always light, and Jae-Ho had thought it okay because she had still been healthy but now... Even her once full cheeks were beginning to hollow.

Jae-Ho carries her outside and places her in the chair, bundling her up in five thick woolen blankets, and he places a chaste kiss to the corner of her lips. And suddenly Jae-Ho wonders why he never kisses her fully, he wasn't her lover, he knew that, but... He throws the thoughts to the side, and removes his shirt in the scorching heat of the sun which currently felt like Satan's solarium.

Midnight giggles and Jae-Ho rolls his eyes, everytime he'd take off his shirt she'd do that, just to annoy Jae-Ho, just to make him shy but as he grew older, all he would do is rolls his eyes and smirk. Yes, confidence comes sooner or later.

Jae-Ho starts cutting the wood, the wood splitting with a clean _thunk_ as he swings the axe.

"You know you've got a pizza my heart Jae-Ho..." Midnight pauses to take a deep breath, watching with droopy eyes. "But what the hell are you doing?"

Jae-Ho swings the axe again, hitting the wood with a clean strike as it pops into half. Jae-Ho grins at her, easily hefting the axe onto his shoulder. His muscles pop and Midnight points that out with a tired smile. "I could break my skull off your muscles Jae-Ho."

"Hmm, I would rather have you break my heart than your skull." Jae-Ho smiles fondly at her and tells her to go to sleep. "I'll wake you up when I'm finished."

Midnight nods and mumbles something, and seconds later she's gone slack. _So much for talking,_ he thinks to himself with a fond smile.

It's after he's cut enough wood that he starts a fire, a wonderful one, one that kindles a melodic symphony of crackling, and Jae-Ho is very suddenly reminded of the lack of song in the Forbidden Forest at night, and he blanches. When he had walked past it in the morning, rushing to get home before Midnight awoke, the forest was singing again, suddenly very happy. A booming avian orchestra, a dawn chorus.

He sets the little metal cauldron on the blazing fire, and he begins to make the first tisane. Mixing lemon verbana and peppermint together, adding the occasional lavender blooms that smells of cherried blossoms. It stews away, and Jae-Ho makes other things as well.

"Midnight, baby, wake up," he sings lightly, and he watches as Midnight cracks her eyes open.

"Is this for me?" she asks, looking up at him with bejewelled, sparkling eyes that seem so impeccably fond, and suddenly Jae-Ho is very glad he stole from the witch's garden.

(Stupid.)

(You'll regret it.)

Jae-Ho sneers at the voice to shut up, and he smiles sweetly at Midnight and nods with his eyes closed. Midnight sips at the cider and instantly spits it out. "It tastes like horseradish or something! I hate it!" she whines, pointing at the glass accusingly.

"Hmmm, well it'll make you better and if you don't want to die-"

"But I do want to die," she rasps out dramatically.

"-and if you love me you'll drink it. All of it. And don't spit it down the plant pot like you did with your elixirs. Yeah, I saw that."

"The elixirs tasted like a pancreas. They were bad."

"A... pancreas?"

"That's a type of pancake, right?"

"That's a part of the human body."

"Oh."

"Drink it. Now," he orders.

Midnight sighs and gulps it all down. Jae-Ho smiles happily and kisses her cheek to congratulate her.

Midnight looks as if she's going to throw the glass into another dimension.

Jae-Ho starts spooning her the tisane and Midnight's eyes light up at the apparently sweet taste, saying it was very refreshing and sweet; 'like that ice-cream stuff we had one time.'

Midnight heaves a contented sigh and drinks more and Jae-Ho laughs at the sparkle in her eyes, one he hasn't seen in a long time.

Jae-Ho laughs again as she says another one of her horrible puns, overjoyed and delighted.

Midnight wasn't going to die.

There isn't enough; Jae-Ho realises this on the sixth day.

He needs a bit more, just a bit more.

Midnight walks a bit more. She helped him cut the vegetables in the kitchen today, using him as support as she walked back to her bed when she felt a bit sleepy. She wobbles slightly but Jae-Ho can already see improvement. She breathes easier, she sleeps easier, speaks easier.

But the medicine had now been drained, and Jae-Ho shudders as he looks outside at the taunting forest.

He has to go back.

Tonight.

Jae-Ho dons the cloak again, securely placing Midnight's flower-crown on his head and he lights the oil lantern; its orange glow looking at him again and tutting. Jae-Ho glares at the lantern.

And he enters the forest once again.

He sees the cottage. He sees the stone wall. He sees the oak tree. He doesn't see the cloaked-figure who sat waiting for him on the tree.

Jae-Ho runs and easily jumps over the stone wall again. Ignoring the large oak tree where a sinister-smiling man watches him with amusement as he again ploughs through the witch's magical herbs.

A howl echoes through the night, mewling and snarling with its deadly voice, sounding like a wailing spectre, and Jae-Ho imagines that it's probably the witch's doing. The witch, with doom-laded eyes and a heart bloated with hatred.

The man watches Jae-Ho, and it is then, that he begins to play the beguiling pipe in his hands. He plays a tune with a sepulchre melody, laced with a despairing, rotting beauty of enchantment.

Jae-Ho doesn't scream, he's too shocked to. Instead... he screams with eyes, with his soul. He screams for vicious mercy silently, and his head pounds as he hears that symphonic ballad echo in his head, and as he turns around, so very slowly, he meets eyes with the one they call the Pied Piper.

The Piper smiles with bewitching, archangel-white teeth, he smiles with those wretched, sickly teeth as he plays the song. And now he realises that this is the song Midnight sings while she sleeps. The Piper stops, his lips relaxing into a serene smile.

"Hello, Jeon Jae-Ho," he says, and Jae-Ho can't feel anything but _numbnumbnumb_ , too scared, too vulnerable, too... No, no, no, this couldn't be happening, not now.

Every syllable the Piper spoke with his sonorous, rich timbre of a voice is a gunshot to Jae-Ho's heart; a sword ripping through his chest; daggers slicing off his ears; acid burning his very body until not even ashes are left.

"You stole from his garden," the Piper states, and the hood he wears only makes him look more eerie than he already is. "I don't know if you're incredibly brave or incredibly stupid."

(You're going to die. All alone.)

(What about poor Midnight? She'll have thought you've abandoned her.)

(Should've listened to me, Jae-Ho.)

"Fear has a large shadow but he himself is small," the Piper says coming closer to Jae-Ho, and Jae-Ho gasps as he removes his hood, his eyes wide and horror-struck.

The man is beyond handsome, with milk-chocolate skin and matching chocolate curls, a gentle smile with enthralling, melted chestnut-gold for eyes. Taller than Jae-Ho, and the Piper smiles sweetly. "I remember you, you-"

A door booms open, and Jae-Ho stumbles and falls down backwards, head making contact with the ground. And suddenly the air is as hot as Greek fire, as hot as a dragon's breath, as hot as sugar-sweet death. And Jae-Ho's blood goes as foul as a witch's broth, his heart simmers in terror as hot as the devil's brew, and Jae-Ho can feel something slithering around his ankle; something akin to a conjuror's silky smoke, vining and sheathing itself around his ankle, and... it pulls.

Jae-Ho screams as he's dragged by an invisible force all across the garden, and he hears the Pied Piper chuckle, and whispers something. Jae-Ho is then put to a sudden stop, and there is the witch himself, standing there in all his magnificent glory.

The witch is pulchritudinous in everyway imaginable. He has mamba-black hair that has the lustrous shine of a meshed-steel knife, all swept to one side of his sublime face, hiding the ring in the very arch of his brow. His lips are siren-red, nectarine sweet and pouted, and Jae-Ho sees a flash of pink muscle, encompassed with another silver ring, swipe across those suede-soft lips. Jae-Ho can imagine the sugar and sweet that sits in those lips, spouting melacholy promises of life, only to be nightshade sap in disguise. The witch sneers at Jae-Ho – maliciously alluring – to reveal pristine, calcite-white teeth.

His skin is skull-white, smooth and porcelain, and a little scar rests against his cheek. But it is his eyes that captivate Jae-Ho: They're night-dark. Pools of ink, devouring light in their intensity, billowing clouds of volcanic ash - they bury obsidian and jet and tar in their deep depths. The witch has nebulous eyes that hold beautiful celestial bodies in them, fragmented stars and broken constellations.

"Thief," speaks the witch, and Jae-Ho is stunned. The witch has a dulcimer voice yet he sounded so cruel, so merciless, so disgustingly sinister that Jae-Ho can already feel the tears coming to his eyes.

That's when it happens, it's sudden. The witch kicks Jae-Ho, so hard with little-to-none effort, and Jae-Ho can feel magma-hot blood spurt out his mouth. The kick is like that of metal, as if somebody had fired a whole fleet of canons at Jae-Ho, and the witch smiles pleasantly as Jae-Ho's sobs fill up the shrine-like silence of the forest.

"Don't cry like a bitch," the witch says with an ill-omened scowl. "You should've expected this, you fucking piece of shit." Then the witch calms himself, and Jae-Ho hiccups on another wail. "From my personal experience, pain is the best torture, and I wonder what would happen to your frail body if I kicked you once more."

"Nnnn-nuh, please," Jae-Ho cries out, sounding so very pathetic and pitiful. "You duh-don't... don't under-understand."

The witch grabs a fistful of Jae-Ho's hair and wrenches it back, and Jae-Ho audibly gasps as he has no choice but to look directly into the eyes of the witch. His eyes are soulless and passionless, they penetrate into Jae-Ho's heart as a searing pain goes through Jae-Ho skull.

Jae-Ho whimpers as the witch comes closer to him, too close. "Explain to me, and I'll see whether you're not as selfish as you seem," drawls the witch, ignoring Jae-Ho's attempts to pry off his hands.

"My fruh-friend, she-"

"Simply a friend?" asks the witch, a brow raised in question.

"Yuh-yeah," Jae-Ho lets out, unable to breathe as he feels the witch lightly trace the wings tattoo on his neck.

"I don't think so," says the witch. "You can only go so far for friends." The witch grins, eyes glinting with violence. "I think you love her, I think you love her so much that you wouldn't mind if I peeled off your skin if it meant she was safe. Correct?"

Jae-Ho can only nod in confirmation, and the witch's eyes flash with something unknown – something evil. "Stupid child," spits the witch with slight vexation lacing his tone, voice nipping at Jae-Ho's ears like acid. "Hurry up and finish your fucking sob story."

"She's sick. She's ruh-really sick. I'm suh-sorry but the medicine she nuh-needs only grows here. I-I'm sorry." Jae-Ho looks into those eyes that are devoid of life and glee, and he can see the heart of stone the witch carries.

After awhile, the witch speaks with a little hum to his raspy voice, "You must need my herbs because your friend will die without them, correct?"

"Yuh-yes." Jae-Ho grits out, hating the fact that the witch seems to spit mocking fire with every syllable word he speaks.

The witch smiles, a truly horrifying sight. If Jae-Ho had seen this smile on anyone else, he would've thought it adorable, all gummy and adorable.

"You have..." The witch starts and comes closer so that Jae-Ho can smell him – intoxicating moon shadows, meringue-sweet rose blossoms, luscious diamond dust and the dazzling sugary smell of blood. The witch finishes, "A stunning flower crown."

Jae-Ho had almost forgotten about the crown that Midnight had made. It was buttermilk-yellow vinalla orchids and sorbet-pink blooms.

"I'll let you take whatever you want, how much you want." Another smile. "For that crown."

Jae-Ho doesn't think twice before handing it over. "Who made it?" the witch asks, his fingers curling around the crown, but the look in the witch's eyes say that he knows, that he hopes it is who he wishes it to be.

"Midnight," Jae-Ho says uneasily. "Midnight made it."

"Midnight..." the witch hums. "Such a pretty name." The witch looks at Jae. "Midnight-Celestín Starwind?"

Jae-Ho can feel his mind reeling at the witch's 'guess', and his eyes widen in fear. The witch laughs, psychotic and chilling, ringing with screams of thousands of tortured souls.

The black of the witch's abyss-like eyes sparkle when Jae-Ho spoke Midnight's name, too full of light, too full of delight, and Jae-Ho can only think how foul, how bitter Midnight's name sounds rolling off the witch's pomengranate tongue.

(It doesn't.)

The witch looks at him suddenly, his eyes sharp and disdaining, and Jae-Ho scatters quickly.

He fills his basket and runs.

Doesn't look back.

Don't look back.

Never look back.

Wouldn't have wanted to see the witch's bloodcurdling smile anyways.

"Why do you look so tired?" asks Midnight as he comes into the house, holding a bag of food that he had asked one of the village children to go get him. "Did you not sleep?"

"Don't worry about me," he says, but Midnight's eyes are round in worry. "Don't worry," he says again, and he bends down to place a kiss on her nose. "I'm fine."

But yet, Midnight forces him to lay down beside her, and Jae-Ho falls asleep to Midnight stroking his hair and singing him a song. And Midnight smiles at Jae-Ho's sleeping form, he looks like a child, face squished against the pillow and lips gently parted.

"I love you," she whispers to the boy who smells like sunlight and sea-foam.

Midnight gets better. She gets so much better.

And Jae-Ho spoons more of the magical herbs into her mouth.

But yet, it is today, that he realises that Midight is truly getting better.

Here he was, with tangerine liquor burning in his eyes, as a tropicalbird with a plumage of sorbet-pink and buttermilk-yellow sings a symphonic song as he hides behind a tree of oak. He's wandered much further than the average hunter, and he hides as he eyes an oblivious deer.

His steps are incredibly quiet, even more silent than the little drop that just fell down from the sky. He gets an arrow ready, pulling it against the string of his bow and the string goes taut. He waits as the deer swings about its antlers madly, attempting to get some sort of vine off.

Jae-Ho inhales, then he exhales. Just as he's about to shoot, somebody else beats him to it.

The arrow nicks his ear, and Jae-Ho can feel the little rivulet he feels that trickles down his earlobe, and the arrow - shot by the stranger - hits the deer exactly where Jae-Ho had wanted it to.

He turns around sharply in bewilderment, looking dumbly astonished.

Jae-Ho feels like crying as he sees the one person he's been wanting for infinity: Midnight.

She stands there with a content smile on her face, hands slightly shaky – still sick after all.

Her eyes turn to Jae-Ho and she speaks, almost casual, "Wasn't too bad, was it?"

Jae-Ho runs towards her and picks up the girl he loves so much, and he spins her round and round and round and round. "Gem," he whispers the name he had given her so long ago. He presses their foreheads together, and he can hear the gentle sound of Midnight's laughter.

"Don't cry," she says to him, stroking away the joyful tears that run down Jae-Ho's rosy cheeks. "I'm back, yeah?" Jae-Ho presses her hand more to his cheek as he smiles and nods, tears still coming down his face. "So, no more sad, we're going to be happy, okay?"

Midnight finds herself relaxing as Jae-Ho pulls her in again, and she feels the steady thump of his heart, and she strokes his hair again; the locks tickling her ear. "Now, I bought some lunch, no, I _made_ some lunch. I didn't walk here for nothing, so we're gonna eat it, okay?"

They eat underneath the sweet sun and misty, pearl-drops of rain. "Do you wanna hear a joke?" says Midnight as Jae-Ho weaves flowers into her braided hair.

And they are unknowing of the raven bird that has followed Midnight for all her life, that watches them with a haunting devotion and red, red eyes.

After two weeks, Jae-Ho dons the cloak and ventures into the executioner-black night. Yet, it is different this time. The trees aren't hunched, instead they are straight and the branches wave to him, the pebbles create a path for him, and Jae-Ho knows that this forest isn't like any other... it's different. If that wasn't obvious already.

The Piper is nowhere to be seen. And the witch is waiting for him when he arrives.

He looks stunning, and Jae-Ho can instantly see that the witch enjoys playing dress-up, and he seems to be playing a beautiful king today. Adorned with jewels and gold, robes of white silks, he says to Jae-Ho, "You need more." His gaze is glacial, reminding Jae-Ho of sparkling black ice.

The witch takes a look at Jae-Ho, eyes sweeping through Jae-Ho's figure, and Jae-Ho feels instantly vulnerable. And the witch's eyes stop at Jae-Ho's chest, and suddenly Midnight's voice plays in Jae-Ho's head: 'Jeon Jae-Ho, how dare you have tiddies. How dare you strut about with those dangerous tiddies.'

But the witch's gaze isn't comical or kind like Midnight's, it's cold, so cold that Jae-Ho blood goes frozen and his posture frigid. The witch's eyes gaze at the low v-neck Jae-Ho wear, and in the very middle of his collarbones, lays a pendant.

"Your necklace. I want it."

Jae-Ho splutters, and his eyes say everything: There _must_ be something else.

"Do you have a problem?" Then the witch smiles maliciously. "Do you not care about your friend?"

Jae-Ho removes the clasp of the necklace, thin silver that glittered in the stark moonlight, and the pendant itself is sea glass – the colour of indigo joy, shimmering and opaque, and so very sublime. And Jae-Ho remembers when Midnight had made the pendant the first time they had went to the beach.

The witch can most likely see the reluctance and hesitation that Jae-Ho hands over the necklace, and the witch grins.

The witch juts his head towards the herbs. "Go," he says. "And come into my house once you're done."

Jae-Ho's blood runs cold and he looks at the wry smile on the witch's lips. Jae-Ho gulps, and very slowly gets the herbs. Dreading whatever was to come next, he decides he'll drag out how long he takes to get the herbs despite knowing it was pointless. He didn't know what the witch wanted with him, he truly didn't and as he took his time getting the herbs he needed, he realises how beautiful the witch's garden is.

Vibrant and arcipluvial flowers sprout everywhere, decorating the intricate cobblestone path as well, and lush greenery gives the garden a tranquil and serene nature, and perhaps the witch's garden isn't as bad.

"Could I pick some flowers?" he asks, fear lacing every syllable he speaks, having gathered more than enough herbs. "For my friend?"

The witch's eyes snap to him, his lips twitch at the corners unpleasantly, and he says with a dulcimer and deep voice that, "Like I said in our first meeting, you can have whatever you want, how much you want, as long as I get paid. And this necklace is payment enough for the entire garden."

Jae-Ho goes around the garden, and he struggles deciding which pairs of flowers he should pick. His eyes are instantly drawn to the beryl-red shades of the bleeding heart flowers, so he picks them, entwines the vine-flowers with gentle, pastel-shaded Hollyhocks.

Jae-Ho screeches loud as hell as he feels a large hand settle itself on his shoulders. The witch simply looks unbothered at Jae-Ho's, and Jae-Ho finds himself goes redder than the blood moon as the witch's shark-pit eyes bore into him.

"Goldenrod," the witch says, passing him a few citrus-yellow flowers. "Would look pretty with that." The witch has an almost bored look on his face as he motions for Jae-Ho to follow him.

The witch has a vaulting arch of leaf and flora over the entrance to his cottage, and Jae-Ho admires it for a quick second before following the witch to his house. The witch stops at the door, and his eyes tell Jae-Ho to stay there, and then the witch comes back, holding a basket.

"Give this to your Midnight," he says, gently passing the basket to him. "A small gift from me to her."

"You will give this unless you wish to face my wrath," the witch hisses, his lips a sour curve as he looks at Jae-Ho's haunting hesitation to even look at the thing.

"I- wuh-what is-" the witch cuts into Jae-Ho's words.

"Things to eat, things to drink," says the witch. "It will help her health, and I suggest you take it. And, remember that I will know if you throw it away." The witch smiles devastatingly. "And I'm guessing you know the stories of a witch's wrath."

"I quite enjoy giving people who use my magic... A gift, if you will." Then he adds as a second thought, "Like the Piper."

"And Jae-Ho-" Jae-Ho almost reels backwards from the witch speaking his name, it sounds ancient and divine rolling off his tongue and so very _cursed-_ "Well done."

Jae-Ho knows he probably looks like an idiot right now as he stares open-mouthed and wide-eyed; the witch's smirk and raised brow tell him that, and he stammers out, "Wuh-whatever for?"

"Taking care of her." And the witch smiles at him, almost sincere, almost fond, _almost_.

Then the witch's demeanour changes in a split-second, the smile then twists into that psychotic and mysterious smile that he despises so very much and the witch's eyes twinkle, and he points a long, elegant-knuckled finger towards the gate of his house.

"Go. Give your Midnight a kiss from me, hmmm?" The witch tells him.

"I will," Jae-Ho says, lips cold and numb.

**"Go, give your Midnight a kiss from me, hmmm?"**

**Or, perhaps, _his_ Midnight?**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE JUST MET OUR WITCH AKA ENZO KANG AKA DA- nvm, sorry!
> 
> //So much *spice* going on!//
> 
> LMAO, I gotta go to bed now, so... Next few chapters tomorrow? I promise I'll try my best!
> 
> Stay safe!   
> xxx


	4. A Kiss Before Death, A Witch In Her Dream and The Death Of The Cursed Child

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Why would you do that? Why would you steal from someone like him? Why would you steal from a witch? Why would you put yourself in danger like that?" Midnight seems absolutely fearful. "You know once the villagers find out exactly what you did, they'll kill you, they'll kill you and it'll be all my fault, and I don't want you to be–" Midnight has tears filling her now glossy eyes- "I don't want you to die! Why would you do–"
> 
> "–Because I love you," he spits out, and Midnight looks at him strangely. "I love you," he breathes, much more quieter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ////So... Did you enjoy our wonderful Enzo Kang last chapter?/// ( ͡ʘ ͜ʖ ͡ʘ)
> 
> Well, we'll be getting more of him in this chapter anyways! Yayyyyyyyy!  
> What's your favourite food? (͠≖ ͜ʖ͠≖) Mine's is Biriyani = King. My desi gang will back me up here.  
> Also, wonderful people, if you're enjoying this story or if you're Ajane, please tell me. ᕕ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)ᕗ
> 
> ~~~~~TRACKLIST  
> [After The Darkest Hours – Four Theme](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbwNlbJAZJ8)  
> [Blood // Water - Grandson](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc_8tbGhXUc)  
> [The Mystic – Adam Jensen](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRUOGd_9orc)
> 
> Safe readings everyone!

**Chapter Three: The One Who Stole From The Witch - Part 3**

"I love you."  
"사랑해."

**HE DOESN'T GIVE** the kiss.

Yet he places the basket beside Midnight who sits up, frowning as she sees Jae-Ho come in late in the afternoon, once again.

"Where do you go?" she asks him, holding the basket in her hands.

Jae-Ho simply smiles. "You're not answering my question, Jae-Ho, where do you keep going?" she asks again.

"I have to get your medicines, Midnight," he tells her.

"Doesn't the doctor give you them?"

Jae-Ho freezes, then he smiles. "He used to, but he was giving me the wrong medicines. I went... somewhere and found out the right medicines, and he's been giving me better medicines, but I have to walk quite a bit to get there."

"Can I come with you next time?"

"No." Jae-Ho gives her a pointed look. "You can't go. You're still weak." Jae-Ho relaxes his face, and gestures for her to open up the basket. "The man wanted to gift you something, he told me I could only see if you wanted me to."

Midnight opens the basket with shaky hands, her head tilted and her brows furrowing adorably as she peers at the basket's contents. "He has pretty handwriting," she says, and Jae-Ho frowns, and she waves about a little note.

"What does it say?"

"Oooh, it's a love letter." Jae-Ho is already about to snatch it off. "Hey, I'm kidding. It just says to take care of myself, which is very nice of him, tell him I say thank you."

"There's a mirror," she says, holding up a glamorous mirror, bespeckled with dazzling jewels and golden carvings. "Holy shit, is he rich?"

Jae-Ho can only nod dumbly as Midnight pulls out a black leather journal and a plum-purple quill. _Things to eat– my ass_ , thinks Jae-Ho.

Midnight's mouth waters as she sees cookies. "Cookies!" she exclaims, holding the still-warm cookies in her small hands. "Tea?" she says, holding a crystalline jug of honey-golden liquid, and inside the liquid is withered rose petals. "Chocolate!" Midnight squints her eyes. "It has glitter in it."

Jae-Ho startles looking at Midnight's hair one morning. The top half of her head is still its gorgeous black, but then the other half has gone ombre: midnight-blue fading into a wine-red; enchanting and royal and a cursed thing of the witch.

The side-effects of magical herbs growing out of season.

Jae-Ho can hear the witch's laugh from miles away, and it seems to be coming right from that cursed mirror.

Tonight is a beautiful day, Jae-ho thinks, as he looks at the serene and tear-worthy beauty of nature, terrifyingly surreal as always. The sky is aflame with glittering and twinkling stars that reflected the pure and the sheer majestic beauty of billions of things that are scattered like diamonds across the velvety royal blue sky. And in the very middle was the moon, so huge and round with dazzling and astonishing silver; casting the most comforting and loving light it could muster.

"Jae-Ho-ah?" says Midnight, and Jae-Ho hums in response. "I had a dream last night, and I was hoping you could explain."

Jae-Ho looks at the beguiling woman who has her head against his chest, big hand tangled within the locks of her enchanting hair. They both sit outside, during the darkest of night, and both were simply enjoying eachother's company: watching the stars, listening to crickets chirrup and feeling the steady thump of eachother's hearts.

"What is it?" he asks, voice dulcet and innocent – Jae-Ho had always hated it. He hated how when he talked to other people, his voice is all resonant and rich and baritone, yet when it came to Midnight, his voice would be all soft and sweetly child-like.

"Well," she sings. "I had a dream, and it was... weird? Like, not weird as in I had flowers and houses chasing me, more of in weird as if it was actually happening."

"Explain," Jae-Ho says, sitting up. He pulls Midnight up by her waist and sits her in front of him. "And with my grand words of wisdom, I'll see if I can help."

And so Midnight starts, reciting every peice of seemingly bland information to Jae-Ho, who listens with deadly concentration, adding on that: "It felt real, because I swear that I passed the forest tonight but then... BOOM! I went blank, and I wake up in my bed."

_Midnight stands in a forest, during the darkest of nights. A night so dark that glittering obsidian and squid ink at twilight couldn't have been so dark. And then a marrow-freezing chill howls in the night, a heart-haunting voice sings a welcoming song of sorrowed love and pain, and Midnight looks around in a silent awe._

_The forest is truly beautiful, she thinks. And the smell of singed chocolate and crystallised apricots rots the air as she walks through the forest. It was simple at first: Just keep walking and walking and walking, just keep pretending to be oblivious to the teeny-weeny eyes that follow._

_But then Midnight saw it. A little raven bird, the one that she used to play with as a child, the one who had always guided her when she was lost, the one that had disappeared so suddenly._

_"Birdie?" she questions, and she smiles – huge and dazzling – as she realises that it is her special bird, she could recognise it is him from the little greenish shimmer from his plumage. "You've been gone for so long," she says, kneeling down onto the ground where the raven-bird hops and lets out little gurgling croaks. "Where have you been?" she asks him, stroking his wings with a gentle finger. She smiles again, charming as always. "I missed you, my mysterious friend."_

_The raven-bird suddenly soars high in the sky, and Midnight laughs as the bird takes to the skies. And she follows him, like always, always following the little bird since the very minute she was born. Everytime she followed the bird, he lead her to something amazing; like Jae-Ho, she thinks with a shy smile._

_"Where are you taking me?" The bird doesn't answer her question, and Midnight struggles to follow as the raven-bird's colours match perfectly with the sky._

_The raven-bird sits on her shoulder after sometime, and she strokes his beak, planting a sweet kiss on his wings. And she looks around in pure wonder, because suddenly, the forest isn't so dark. It's ethereal._ _  
_

_The dark of the forest is set a-glow with a galaxy and plasma blue, and little flickering dots of majestic magenta-pink flow delicately in the velvet-black night. The litt;e twinkling sound of euphonic singing lightens up the sensuos hum of the forest, a sultry and mesmerising song slithers into Midnight's ears like milky smoke._

_Then she sees it, a mythical, magical creature comes out of a glimmering blue bush. It's a fairy, she recognises from the fables and stories she would read for hours on end as a child. A fairy, fanciful and surreal, with a gentle, round face. Skin the colour of blue porcelain, with gentle, slithery wings that flow so slowly, as if dancing._

_Midnight sees more of them, coming out, and they circle her, ever so kindly. And she giggles and laughs, spinning around to follow their twirling dance and ravishing faces, absolutely tiny – only as big as Midnight's elbow to her wrist._

_She holds up a finger, and the fairy nuzzles it with a fond smile, and Midnight feels as if she were in a heavenly bliss and an opulent taste of euphoria. Because it's all so seemingly unreal. But then something rustles behind her as the fairies look behind her in fear, and they fly away; twirling, dancing, singing. But the magic, the beauty of the forest doesn't leave._

_Then the raven-bird disappears into a grove of trees, and Midnight gingerly approaches the trees, absolutely cautious as she can no longer hear anything but the deafening silence of the forest._

_Then she feels it, a presence, hidden in the trees._

_A presence so powerful that the ticking, black expanse of time seems to still. A commanding presence that demands the compelling attention of everything that breathes, everything that lives and everything that is dead._

_"Who's there?" she asks, saccharine voice echoing. "I know you're there."_

_The presence remains quiet. "Don't be scared," she tells whoever it is._

_A laugh echoes from behind the trees, sonorous and sinister, wicked yet so chillingly pleasant. Yet Midnight doesn't feel anything she should be feeling, instead she feels a magma warmth sending little shocks down her spine._

_"I'm not scared," says the voice. A voice like bottled thunder, like withered-petal poetry, a voice filled with centuries worth of pain and war._

_"Then come out," she tells the voice, inching slightly closer, lips parted._

_"Then you'll be afraid," the voice says, fruity and honeyed voice filling the entire forest, and Midnight wonders why she's never heard such a rich and raspy voice before. And she sees it, a flash of silver-tinsel eyes behind the shadows._

_"No I won't." Midnight smiles reassuringly, hoping that the man – whoever he is – can see it. "I won't be afraid, I promise."_

_"Okay then..."_

_The figure steps out from the shadows, each step more bloodcurdling than the next, and all Midnight does is watch, as a breathtaking man is illuminated by the moonlight. The man is more beautiful than she has ever seen, ravishing the way fragmented constellations and broken promises are._

_With dewy, fondant skin that is scintillating. Smoky, sultry eyes that captivate and hypnotise in their entrancing, galaxy-like nature. Cherry red lips that are butter soft, pulled into a smirk, little sparkles of calcite-white teeth revealed. And Midnight doesn't find the man who towers over her scary at all._

_All the twinkling fairies, luminescent lights and trickling water streams are all forgotten. And when the man advances a bit more, and when Midnight looks into his eyes, she sees it. In those eyes, she sees the mind of a serpentine king, with a mind so ancient, a mind written way before the language of ice. She sees a man... lost within the agonising throes of torment._

_"I know who you are..." she tells him, and the man simply looks at her with his head tilted. "You're a witch, aren't you?" Then she adds, "The one in the Forbidden Forest?"_

_The man smiles. "Well done..." Then he asks, "You aren't afraid?"_

_"Not really," she says with a smile. "You're not as scary as everyone keeps saying you are." She tilts her head. "You seem nice."_

_Perhaps there was no fear because it's all just a dream?_

_The witch comes closer to her, so that he towers right above her, and Midnight realises she comes only a few inches above his elbow. She freezes as she feels a cold hand on her cheek, absolutely gelid, and then her forehead burns as the witch places a sugar-sweet kiss there._

"It was super weird because when I tried to talk to him more, he suddenly blew this golden dust in my face and next thing I know... I'm in my bed," she tells Jae-Ho is stock-still, seemingly petrified out of his mind.

"What else did he say? Midnight, tell me what else he said?" he asks as a rising panic sits in his throat.

"I... don't remember, but Jae-Ho, he was wearing the necklace I gave you, the one with sea glass, and then... I realised you're not wearing it." Midnight adds much to Jae-Ho's horror that, "You're not wearing the ring I made you either, I know this is stupid to be sad about but I wear yours."

"Gemmie, I–"

"Yuh-you always look tired even though I-I help you with hunting now, you sluh-sleep in all the time, the buh-bottom half of my hair's gone a weird colour and you tried to _cut it off_ while I was sleeping." She takes a deep breath, and Jae-Ho hates the little stutters that come out of her sweet mouth, hating how she wrings her hands in worry. "And your boots are always muddy, your clo-cloak gets more ripped every time I wake up, and you smell like-like magic and the forbidden forest."

"Gemmie... Midnight... I-" Jae-Ho starts and Midnight looks up, and he's quiet because she looks so terrified out of her mind, she looks so sad as she looks at him.

"The medicine I need is out of stuh-stock! I fuh-found out a few days ago wh-when washerwoman came- came to visit me! But you keep bringing more of it!" Midnight looks at him again, eyes rounded and horror-struck. "It takes four days to go to the- the market, I know you Jae-Ho. You wouldn't have left me for four days wheh-whether it be with someone or without." Midnight looks at him again and the heaviness of her eyes crushes Jae-Ho, and his blood runs cold. "What did you do?"

"I'm so sorry..." Jae-Ho says as guilt and shame overtake him and all he can do is open his arms for Midnight and envelope her, she wholeheartedly takes the hug and as she squishes her face against his chest, she can feel the racing thumps of his heart.

And he confesses what he had done, "I stole from the Wicked Witch of The East."

And she whispers, "This is all my fault."

And it's the worst thing in the world.

They both sit outside their house. Both of them deathly quiet as Jae-Ho plucks out feathers from a bird to make quills to sell, a wry smile on his lips realising not many people were buying their meat because of Midnight's hair; she had been magicked, everybody knew it.

Jae-Ho had heard all the gossip and whispers when he had gone to the market with Midnight, having her wear a hood to hide her hair. He had seen them all looking at her, and she had hid behind him, not liking the stares of cold, lingering eyes.

"What's he like? The witch, I mean," Midnight asks playing with her hands, breaking the unsettling silence finally. "He can't have been nice."

Jae-Ho remembers: pouty pink lips, pale-moon skin; glittering, onyx eyes, glinting lip and eyebrow rings all arranged into sculpted perfection, an unsettling perfection.

"He's terrifying, his- his eyes were so bloody scary, I felt like I was burning in them and all he did was look at me."

"I'm sorry," Midnight breathes out and Jae-Ho is instantly kneeling before her as she sits on the tree stump, grabbing hold of her hands and squeezing them tight. He's about to say that it isn't her fault but he looks at her face and knows nothing will convince her, so he settles to brush her hair out of her face and squeeze her hands instead.

"Why did you do it?" she asks suddenly, still not looking at him.

"What do you mean 'why'?" he asks, frowning.

"Why would you do that? Why would you steal from someone like him? Why would you steal from a witch? Why would you put yourself in danger like that?" Midnight seems absolutely fearful. "You know once the villagers find out exactly what you did, they'll kill you, they'll kill you and it'll be all my fault, and I don't want you to be–" Midnight has tears filling her now glossy eyes- "I don't want you to die! Why would you do–"

"–Because I love you," he spits out, and Midnight looks at him strangely. "I love you," he breathes, much more quieter.

Midnight looks so completely crestfallen. "Oh, Jae-Ho, I know, I know, I know! I know you love me, and I love you, too! But–"

"No! You don't love me like I love you!" he exclaims suddenly, unaware of the raven-bird that watches them. "You don't love me like I love you," he says again but much more sadder.

"Jae-Ho..." Midnight says, and she looks at him in confusion, and Jae-Ho remembers how Midnight looks like she's angry when she's confused, remembers how it looks like she glares at you, and how her lips stick together and almost scowl in distaste. "What do you mean?"

"I mean that I would love you so that eternity couldn't rip us apart, I mean that I would recognise you in every life we could ever be in, I mean that I would go to the edge of the sky just to see you happy." Jae-Ho finds himself tearing up as he says those words, the words that he had ached to say for so long. "I would let them rip apart my soul and devour my heart if it kept you safe. I would..." Tears flow down Jae-Ho's face, and his voice cracks as he speaks. "I would do anything for you." Then he adds fiercely, "Because I love you, and I'll never stop."

And so as Midnight stays quiet, seemingly stunned into silence, and Jae-Ho finds himself snaking a hand behind her neck. And he places his lips gently over hers. _Just... this once. Just this small kiss,_ Jae-Ho thinks to himself. _Just one. Just this one moment of weakness._

Jae-Ho expects her to place her hands on his chest and push him away, yet she doesn't. So Jae-Ho delves in deeper, feeling himself go weak at the taste of nectarine sweets and raspberry fondants in her mouth. The kiss felt forbidden, and Jae-Ho understands why so many people fall into temptation all the time. He understands if _this_ is what it feels like.

And their lips part for one second, just for one second before all those entangled emotions devour eachother whole again. And he tastes them again, those sugar-plum sweet lips he had chased after for so long, and he feels the sensual touch of how Midnight clings onto his shoulders, simply asking for more.

It's intoxicating and potent how their tongues mash together, and Jae-Ho spills every raw emotion, every passionate and fiery feeling into this last melding of their lips. And he feels Midnight's feelings too; he feels every sherry-sweet emotion she pours into his soul, and he takes it, he takes it so that he feels a euphoric high.

And he pulls away, only by an inch or so, only so little that their foreheads are still connected, so that his hands stays tangled in her hair, so that her hands remain on his shoulders. They both breathe hard and ragged, little sighs escaping from both their lips, little pants, and Jae-Ho smiles – mesmerisingly handsome with his eyes closed, and he lets out a childish giggle.

And Midnight does too. And Jae-Ho encases the woman into his arm, tight and promising. And he places a kiss onto her hair, so very sweet, and he can feel Midnight smile against his chest. "I love you," she says quietly.

"I love you, too," he says, pulling away from the embrace.

Jae-Ho smiles looking at the cherry-redness of her lips, the shy blush on her cheeks, and Jae-Ho says with an embarrassed tone, a very sudden shyness, "Did I do good? L-Like did you enjoy it?"

And just as Midnight about to say something, she looks up, above his shoulder to see that oh-so dreaded archer pointing right at them, her smile fades, and within seconds she's grabbed Jae-Ho and pulled him down with her. Jae-Ho's eyes go wide in confusion, but the minute an arrow goes whizzing past their heads, a dawn of realisation comes down on his face.

"Run," is all Midnight's says.

Jae-Ho can hear livid yells and angered shouts, so many of them, all like the cackles of the devil. The village elders have come to kill them.

"Run Gem! RUN!"

(Run.)

"What do you think I'm doing?!"

Jae-Ho clutches her hand, his grip unwavering and his terror is absolutely torrential and mad.

Midnight scrambles after him and for one second when Jae-Ho looks back, he can see the look on her face: _We're going to die, aren't we?_

 _No,_ he thinks. _No, I won't let us!_

The archers behind them curse and shout and swear, their feet like the angry, stampeding hooves of a herd of centaurs.

"There she is!"  
"Cursed child! Kill her before the witch comes!"  
"Hurry up! Get out of the forest and kill the magicked child!"

Jae-Ho can see The Forbidden Forest in front of them, and he runs right into it and as he does so, another arrow _thump_ s itself into a tree.

There are too many of them, Jae-Ho knows this, and it's impossible to outrun so many of them. But if they could get to the witch, because they were almost there.

(Almost.)

( _HELP! HELP! HELP! HELP! HELP! HELP!_ The trees scream, and the vines tangle some of the attackers but it's not enough, and it's too late as an arrow pierces through Midnight's shoulder.)

Midnight shrieks and her knees buckle as she tries to run but she can't, Jae-Ho knows, so he grabs her waist and hoists her up, forcing her to continue running.

There's another whizz and all Jae-Ho can feel is a scorching pain in his leg, an agonising pain that makes him let out a shrill scream of torment, and the world stills for just a second, just a little second that Jae-Ho swears he sees the shadow of The Pied Piper, just for a split-second.

"Oh f-" Midnight is cut off by the loud thud as Jae-Ho falls to the ground, unable to take the searing pain in his leg and perhaps it's the magical herbs Midnight takes, or perhaps it's her unfettered sheer will to survive that she manages to lift Jae-Ho up and continue running, albeit a bit slower.

And the sounds of running come closer and closer and closer and closer until another arrow thumps into the sole of Midnight's foot.

And they both go sprawling on the ground, the dirty gritting of the Earth piercing their skin.

"We'll show you more mercy than the witch."  
"We're sorry children."  
"Hush, it'll be done with soon."

"NO!" Jae-Ho shrieks, attempting to pull a sobbing Midnight closer to him, attempting to protect the one person he loves most.

He feels a mortifying wave of misery and gut-wrenching sadness as Midnight wheezes out, her voice high and so very terrified as she cries, "I'm scared."

Jae-Ho is about to say something, just about to say something when something cold stabs him right in between his ribs, puncturing and ripping through his flesh, and suddenly Jae-Ho can't breathe.

Midnight screams, a horrible heart-rending sound that rips apart the air but a bitter hand clamps itself over her mouth, Midnight thrashes about and tries to break free but it's useless, it was from the very beginning.

Oh. _Oh._

Jae-Ho can feel tears streaming down his face too, just like Midnight, but he smiles at her, his vision is blurring, blood pouring out his mouth and he tries to say it: _Don't be scared, I'm here, I love you._

Midnight stops struggling when they plunge an arrow deep into her throat.

Midnight still tries to gurgle something, _something_ , and her hand lightly touches Jae-Ho's, a last spark of life and warmth,

Jae-Ho looks up and his eyes meet Midnight's... And Midnight's bore back into his but her eyes are lifeless and... dead, she's dead.

"Nuh-no..." Jae-Ho whimpers out, and it's the last thing he says as he feels both the blood and the life drain out of him, the shadows of the village elders leaving.

And the two die, side by side.

**"I'm scared~"**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: LMAO I wrote my first ever kiss scene, LMAO. As someone who is a Nine X Zero shipper – despite those two fuzzballs having absolutely no interactions together – writing the kiss physically pained me... Or did it? Lmao, when my lil sis reads this she gon' be raging at the fact that Zero has neither met Nine, and that he didn't kiss Nine. RIP Mano. But still, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. Also, as for the people who may be thinking 'What about Four? I thought this was a Four story?' It's... kinda confusing, I haven't decided who it'll be but I am leaning more towards the four side but... Anyhoo~ Loads of Zero X Midnight coming up next chapter, alongside a hot and fresh scoop of Midnight X Four! LMAO, I actually know who she'll end up with... SPOILER AHEAD: Four. Also, the part of Midnight's dream is hundred percent inspired by the scene in Malificent, and the scenery and the fairies I describe are also from that very same scene: [Here's the scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=szu5LL8PgMA), fucking watch it, it's majestic.


	5. The Witch's Price, Her Payment and Jae-Ho's Resentment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Those dark, black eyes with something unfathomable in them, and the glee in there is almost phantom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Zero and Midnight so much that I killed them, I hope you can see my love for them, hehehehe. 🍔ԅ( ͒ ͒ )
> 
> ̿̿ ̿̿ ̿̿ ̿'̿'\̵͇̿̿\з= ( ▀ ͜͞ʖ▀) =ε/̵͇̿̿/’̿’̿ ̿ ̿̿ ̿̿ ̿̿LMAO, I've done a total of fifteen rewrites of this story, it's kind of funny. It started off as 20k+ words oneshot, then I split it into three chapters, then five, then eight, and then I decided I'd like to rewrite the whole thing AND continue it instead of leaving it at a cliffhanger like I planned. Also, what other TTEOTS AU's would you like to see from me? Do you want mafia boss Four? Vampire Eight? Busy CEO Nine who neglects his wife? Like... what do you all wish for?
> 
> ( ง `ω´ )۶ [Dizzy – MISSIO](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyU5sbXd7SQ)  
> ( ง `ω´ )۶ [Under My Spell – The Dazzlings](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ef7PVHOEfvc) (Don't judge me)  
> ( ง `ω´ )۶ [BTS – Pied Piper](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mz8cX-Ai0lE)  
> ( ง `ω´ )۶ [Agust D – Give It To Me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Zgc12yL5ss)
> 
> Hope y'all like this chapter!

**Chapter Four: The One Who Stole From The Witch - Part 4**

"There's a lot further I have to go. Will you be there waiting for me?"  
"내가 가야 할 것이 훨씬 더 많다. 거기에서 나를 기다리 겠니?"

**MEMORIES... THEY SWIRL** through Midnight's mind.

_"Pretty bird?" questions young Midnight, looking at the raven-bird with the green shimmer to his plumage. Tears had streaked themselves down Midnight's plush cheeks – something that still hadn't changed, those plush cheeks – and the bird croaks out a sound of reassurment._

_"What do I do?" she asks the bird who sets himself on a branch, watching her with those abyss-black eyes. Midnight had been abandoned, simply waking up all by herself, and she wonders why those people had took her in only to throw her back out. "They left me... Maybe, I..."_

_Midnight watches the raven-bird, making some sort of odd gesture to follow him, and Midnight does. Walking alongside the flying bird, all the way into a forest, all while cradling a precious locket to her chest; a locket gifted by someone unknown._

_The bird flies and flies, and she runs and runs, and then it is sudden: the raven-bird disappears. "Pretty bird?" she calls out._

_"Is anyone there?" she asks the silent forest after a few minutes of wandering, and then she hears a little rustle of bramble and bush and leaf. "Hello?"_

_"Hi!" a voice exclaims._

_Midnight shrieks as she spins around on her heel, and she freezes as she meets eyes with a certain azure-eyed boy. The boy looks at her with a nougat-sweet smile and eyes that speak honey dew and rose petals. He smells like sunshine and sea foam, his hair smells like wind and free things, and the glistening scent of forest clings to him as well._

_"Hello," he says, and Midnight is reminded of the svelte winds of Summer. "I'm Jae-Ho! You are?"_

_"I'm... Midnight," she tells him, and he gives her an odd look to continue. "Midnight-Celestín Starwind."_

_"Nice to meet you!" he says with a soul-enrichening happiness, and he pulls Midnight into a welcoming hug. "You have super pretty hair! And really pretty eyes! They're the colour of grass! I never knew that was possible! My mum says that my eyes are the colour of the sky!" He looks at Midnight's overwhelmed expression and giggles. "Sorry," he sings. "Didn't mean to flus... fluh... flustor? Fluster! I didn't mean to fluster you! Why's your last name Starwind? Is that a real surname?"_

_"Yes... kind of," she says, a slight smile tugging at her lips. "I was given it because... I was born the Night The Stars Fell, during the meteor shower. November twenty-fifth."_

_"Ooh! I was born September the seventh!" Jae-Ho tilts his head. "Are you okay? I heard you asking for help, that's why I came."_

_"I don't..." Oh god, how was she supposed to tell him everything? 'Oh, hey brotha, guess what? My family abandoned me because they think I'm cursed or something! So I woke up here and followed this bird that took better care of me than my own parents did, and here I am talking to you.' Yes, that seems absolutely excellent. "I don't have anywhere to stay."_

_"Did you lose your parents?" he asks._

_"They're... They left me," she says embarrassed._

_"That's..." Jae-Ho frowns. "Don't be embarrassed! Don't think you did anything wrong! You're perfect and if they left you, they're stupid! C'mon I'll take you to my house, and my parents will keep you safe!"_

_"You have to be more careful!" exclaims little Jae-Ho, running a small hand through his fable-black locks, helping Midnight stand up after her fall._

_"You need to let me perish peacfully!" she tells Jae-Ho. "That's the point of the game! Dying warriors! I'm being one!"_

_"But I don't want you to die!"_

_Jae-Ho tells Midnight that this is his all-time favourite place, he tells Midnight this as he holds her hand, walking through a mystical beach. "Sit down," he tells her. And they both sit down, gazing at the entire beach, and Midnight admires the beach._

_The beach with its velvety, ore-golden sand that made her toes unfurl and scorched pleasantly with blistering heat. And she looks at the trees that encircle the beach-cove they hide in, surrounded by serene and tranquil nature, every tree a vibrant and pleasing sizzling-green. Yet when Jae-Ho takes Midnight's hand again, giggling and squealing in laughter as he steps into the docile sea, Midnight finds herself smiling at the wonderful boy who had so quickly become her home._

_Jae-Ho splashes salty and glassy sea at Midnight's body, and Midnight is almost instant in her attack. And, they ignore the squabbling seagulls and conker-faced people who watch the two children rolling about in the sea._

_And soon they come out of the water, soaking wet, and Jae-Ho's collecting pearl-gloss seashells of different shapes and colours, glowing with an ivory-cream gleam, singing a wondrous melody, kindled by the sea's symphony. And Midnight is collecting sea-glass in every colour there is: lime, aquamarine, cobalt and honey amber. Then, Midnight and Jae-Ho sit next to eachother, Jae-Ho passing Midnight some thin metal chain to make a necklace, and Jae-Ho used brown twine._

_Then they exchanged the handmade necklaces, each crafted with unbreakable love. Midnight wears Jae-Ho's twine necklace, the pretty white seashell resting stark against Midnight's gold skin, and Jae-Ho wears the lagoon-blue necklace._

_A symbol of eternal friendship._

_"Midnight!" exclaims Jae-Ho, tackling Midnight from behind, already-muscly arms wrapped around her, and Midnight kisses the boy's hair._

_"Hmm?" she hums, making yet another flower crown._

_"I love you," he giggles out, placing a kiss on the plushness of her cheeks._

_"Jae-Ho!" Midnight screeches, looking at Jae-Ho's busted lip and bruised cheekbone. "What the hell happened to you?!"_

_"I'm okay," he tells her, attempting to hide the bloody rivulet that trickles down his chin. "I just got into a fight."_

_Midnight is already sitting him down, eyes frantically searching every inch of his face, and Jae-Ho attempts to calm her down, but she aggressively shushes him as a state of panic goes down her mind._

_"Jae-Ho," she breathes out, dabbing a cotton pad on his lips. "I've told you to stop fighting with people, please, you're gonna get hurt one day and-"_

_"-I wouldn't have fought with them but they were saying some shit, and I got angry," he tells her, and Midnight frowns._

_"And what did they say?" she asks, dabbing a damp towel on Jae-Ho's head, soaking up all the blood. "It better have been worth it, or I'll hit you."_

_"They kept talking about you, and your..." Jae-Ho goes a shade of ruby-red. "Your body. And I didn't like it. I know you're body's all..." Jae-Ho makes a hourglass hand movement. "But that doesn't mean they can talk about you, in front of me especially, like you're some object! And when I tried to explain to them, they started calling me names and said something about me not being able to protect myself, so I punched them."_

_Midnight smiles fondly at the shy idiot in front of her, and kisses the tip of his nose._

It's raining when Midnight jolts herself awake, and the moon has set high up.

Midnight likes the rain, it reminded her of something she couldn't quite place her finger on but she truly adored the rain.

She adored the rain when it drizzled down, trickling from the sky in slick orbs of crystal and glass. She smiled at the rain when it thundered down in icy and monstrous globes of unforgiving wetness. She played with the rain when it came down like needles that pricked your skin, and made your cheeks go a mad red. She watched the rain when it simply pattered down against the window, a comforting and un-ending thud on the windows. She loved the rain when it sprinkled and mixed in with the glowing sun, to create a kaleidoscope of regal and breath-taking colours that dominated both the sky and her heart.

She simply just loved the rain and today it was the midnight rain, and today it torrented down like a massive icy waterfall threatening to kill someone, wind whipping harshly outside; howling as if waiting for some sort of sacrifice. Today's weather was threatening and mad.

And suddenly, very suddenly, the memories of what happened surge through her like an overwhelming heat wave, and she grabs her throat, exactly where the arrow had been plunged. And she laughs as if she's going insane, it sounds absolutely howling mad in the dark, because...

There's no mark! As if she hadn't been killed at all!

Then the laughter turns into sobs as she looks at her friend who lays there, lifeless.

And her voice is hoarse and wispy as she says his name, "Jae-Ho! Please! Wake up! PLEASE!" She holds his frigid hands and puts them against her forehead, and they are so, _so_ cold. "Please don't leave me."

"BRING HIM BACK! YOU CAN'T DO THIS TO ME! YOU CAN'T! BRING HIM BACK PLEASE! PLEASE!" Midnight's hands are soaked in his blood, and she tries to feel the beat of his heart, no steady thump, and he no longer smells like cookies and forest and wind, he smells like dirt and copper. "NO! Please, come back to me, Jae-Ho... PLEASE!" Midnight kisses his lips desperately, hoping that he'll magically stir awake, but he doesn't, and so Midnight wails and sobs holding his hands. "Jae-Ho, please, I'm begging you, juh-just want you to wake u-up."

The sudden cawing of a bird makes Midnight's blood go hot in terror, and with wide and glossy eyes she sees the raven-bird there. "He's guh-gone," she tells the bird, tears flowing down her face, and then she notices the basket beside the raven-bird.

She stumbles over, unable to see, and she opens up the basket. And in it is that mysterious person's mirror... No, it's the witch's mirror. The witch's mirror. The witch's. But, when she looks into it, she sees nothing but the vision of a cottage, and she knows what she has to do.

She looks back at the raven and the raven cackles and nudges his head towards the direction of the cottage; and there are identical gems that are on the mirror on the ground, leading a pathway to the witch.

"You're not going to die. I won't let you," Midnight murmurs. She murmurs the exact same words that Jae-Ho had once told her many months ago.

Midnight lifts him up and it's hard, but anything for Jae-Ho.

Anything.

The raven-bird disappears once again into the foliage of lush, emerald trees.  
Midnight walks, Jae-Ho heavy and dead against her aching back.  
Midnight sees a burnt orange glow from far off, and her legs are burning.  
Midnight smells a whole valley of burning roses.  
Midnight sees the shadow of a large oak tree, and passes the shadow of the man who holds a flute.  
Midnight almost screams when the gate creaks open itself, allowing her to come in with Jae-Ho.  
Midnight knocks on the witch's door.

A few moments later, the door opens, and a ravishing man appears. Midnight's spine chills as he smiles at her charmingly.

"I know you~" the witch says, and barely even glances at Jae-Ho. He looks all over Midnight; looking at the wine-red tips of her hair, the pinkness of her lips, the emerald eyes. And his eyes spark, and he smiles warmly at her. He says again, much more sure, "I know you."

The door opens wider, a sweet golden light leaking through. A meaty smell comes through – rich and salty, and Midnight imagines a child's heart. 

"My friend," Midnight speaks, voice hoarse and the witch tilts his head teasingly. "He's duh.... He's dead."

"I know," is what the witch says, and he looks at Jae-Ho on Midnight's back, a simple glance at the dead boy.

"Help me. Please," is all Midnight can say, her legs burning and her heart empty.

The witch caresses her face with gentle hands, his thumb stroking her cheek, and Midnight doesn't even have the energy in her to flinch, even when the witch comes oh-so close; lips brushing her earlobe.

"Magic requires payment, dearest jewel, your friend gave me the flower crown, the ring, the necklace. What shall you give me, what are you willing to give me?" the witch whispers, tongue leaving a wet spot on Midnight's ear, hot breath tickling her ear. When he finally pulls away, his head tilts even more as he gazes into her eyes, searching for the answer.

Midnight thinks of Jae-Ho, his laugh and his smile, his happiness and his pain, his love and his kindness, his sudden boldness an following shyness.

Midnight thinks of happy lunches and dinner. She thinks of sick days took away by gentle nursing and hardwork. Doe eyes filled with love, reflecting the Sun. Muscled arms and playful tackling. A tender hand on her shoulder, teaching her how to shoot. A young boy kicking her in the face. Pancreas and pancakes. Protective gazes and merry laughter.

Midnight thinks of laughter and smiles, tears and sorrow, warm hugs and sweet affection, flowers in braided hair, a giant hand holding a smaller one, a lip ring glinting in the sun. She thinks of a kiss, a bruising and passionate kiss that held so much love.

Jae-Ho was willing to do anything for Midnight, willing to give anything, and Midnight thinks of him bleeding and dying all because of her, and the truth comes from her lips: "Anything."

"But I don't have anything," she adds in despair, all her hope draining.

The witch moves his hand; gently moving it down from her cheek to her jaw and then to underneath her chin, lifting her chin up so she meets his eyes. And she knows what terror Jae-Ho was talking about when she looked into those eyes.

Those dark, black eyes with something unfathomable in them, and the glee in there is almost phantom.

The witch smiles softly and Midnight eyes widen, then the witch grins.

"Oh darling," he says and moves his hand to exactly where the arrow had been a few hours ago. He grins even wider, feeling her gulp. "You do."

Warmth. Tender and sweet warmth is the first thing Jae-Ho feels as he begins to stir. It thaws his tongue and warms his heart, he curls in on himself, and he realised that the warmth comes from a fire. Jae-Ho can tell due to the colours that are peaking through the lids of his eyes, the soothing vermillion and carmine of fire, ginger and lemon dance alongside the red. And he hears the crackling of fire too, the sound is much more nicer than the buzzing cacophony of nonsense he was hearing only a few moments ago; of Midnight's pleading and crying.

Jae-Ho is awake.

Sunlight cascades inside from outside, giving the entire room a beautiful honey glow that looks like that of a coin's, and it warms Jae-Ho through the thickness of the wool blankets that are wrapped around him, and he feels as if he's in a cocoon.

It smells wonderful, absolutely exquisite, like vanilla and flowers and herbs and sugar. And beside him, slumping in a chair is Midnight, looking quite tired but beautiful all the same.

Jae-Ho's tongue feels thick and he forces his eyes open, he forces them wide open, and he calls out for Midnight, "Gem- Gemmie."

Midnight startles awake. Piercing, sea-green eyes meeting his and she's blinking wildly, seemingly shocked into disbelief.

Midnight stares at him for a second before pouncing to him, grabbing his hand and kissing it multiple times and Jae-Ho laughs weakly.

"Jae! Oh my- You're okay, you're really okay! Oh, I thought- I thought you were- you're okay!" Midnight exclaims gleefully, tears of happiness streaming down her face and Jae-Ho lifts his hand up weakly to wipe them away.

"'S okay. I'm here now," he tells her, and Midnight puts his knuckles to her cheek. "Don't cry."

"I was so afraid... I didn't know what to-"

"You did so well," Jae-Ho says firmly, albeit his voice cracking every single second due to not really feeling all that well, and his throat is parched. "You did so well, I'm so proud of you Gemmie. You saved me. You did so fucking well."

"Come here," he breathes out, and Midnight complies.

He wraps an arm around her neck, he cards his fingers through the locks of her hair, and he presses his lips against hers, and for a few moments, they share combined heartbearts and treacle-sweet breaths.

He pulls away from her, and he smiles. "I love you, okay? And I'll get better, and then we'll go find a home, or something. Yeah?"

Midnight's eyes well up with tears again, but they're not happy ones like a few moments ago, they're pained and sad and they freely start spilling from her eyes. She starts murmuring apologies into Jae-Ho's hands, "I'm so sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, so sorry Jae-Ho, I didn't have another choice. Forgive me please." Over and over.

"Midnight, what- what's wrong?" Jae-Ho asks her but she doesn't answer, he repeats the question even louder.

"I love you. I love you so much." Midnight clutches his hand tightly. "You're the bestest friend, you're the bestest everything. Even though I'm me in the end, you've always loved me. Yo loved me, became my home, my family, the love of my life, and you never asked for a thank you. I can't even begin to tell you how lucky I am to have you-"

"Midnight, Midnight..." Jae-Ho says, distress and dread piling into his voice as his terror piles even higher as he figures out where they are, and the footsteps coming down the stairs only confirm where they are. "What did you give him for me? Midnight what have you done?"

"Gemmie, puh-please tell me wuh-what you gave him?" For once Jae-Ho's tears give him an even clearer vision. He feels the horror course through him as the witch appears behind her with a wicked smile.

"I gave him myself." Midnight looks fearful. "It was all I had, all he wanted."

Jae-Ho can't feel anything, can only hear his heart shatter as the witch smiles.

Jae-Ho despises the witch. That realisation comes quick.

He despises the witch when he puts healing potions on his heart where a scar lays.  
He despises the witch when he hisses at Jae-Ho to stay still.  
He despises the witch when he simply grins maliciously at Jae-Ho scathing words.  
He despises the witch when he reminds Jae-Ho of his vulnerability.  
He despises the witch when he threatens to rip out the thread in his heart.  
He despises the witch when he smiles so very fondly at Midnight.  
He despises the witch when he pops sweets and foods into Midnight's mouth.  
He despises the witch when he talks to Midnight as if she's his lover.  
He despises the witch when he drawls Midnight's name with that saccharine tone.

He despises the witch when he does anything at all.

And the witch knows, oh how he _knows_ how much Jae-Ho wishes to burn him alive and rip out his guts and choke him with them. And oh how the witch _laughs;_ loud and pleasant and charming when he catches Jae-Ho glaring at him.

He wants to rip that stupid smile off his face.

The witch is calm right now as he applies something onto the stitched up line on Jae-Ho's stomach, Jae-Ho loathes how the witch can be so... _witchy,_ and makes Jae-Ho hate him by simply breathing. Jae-Ho even hates the way the witch eats chicken. Chicken used to look so nice to Jae-Ho, but now he hates it as much as the witch's pearly teeth.

"You were bought at an incredibly high price dearest thief," the witch tells him, looking back to smile cutely at Midnight who smiles back nervously from the corner. "A very high price indeed."

Jae-Ho verbally growls at the words, but hisses when the witch adds a bit too much pressure - a bit _too_ much just to be by accident. He mumbles something about it hurting, and very quietly, the witch comes closer to his ear and spews out; his hot breath fanning Jae-Ho's ear, "It should hurt."

Midnight smiles at Jae-Ho, and mouths, "Your abs look nice." Jae-Ho smiles, feeling a tiny bit better, and he finds himself blowing a quick kiss in her direction. And as Jae-Ho does start to feel a bit better, because, yeah, his abs are better than the witch's – if the witch even had abs that is.

Then the witch calls out Midnight's name and Jae-Ho wants to punch the witch so very hard in the face so those annoyingly perfect white teeth fall out, _no_ , Jae-Ho would wrench them out with his own hands and laugh as the witch's gums bleed and the witch screams from stabbing agony.

His smiles are sweet and sincere and friendly, unlike the blood-curdling ones he gives at night, not the type of smile where the moonlight makes his smile gleam like the serrated edge of a knife. His voice isn't so cold and dark and spine-chilling, his voice is sweet and rich, melodic and powerful with dulcet undertones. He glows softer in the light and looks angelic white for a second. The witch is surreal in his beauty, the way frost is cold but still beautiful.

His eyes _almost_ stay the same, devouring light in their intensity, obsidian and viscous. They only change when they look at Midnight, fond and sweet and loving, and suddenly they hold too much light for such black eyes.

The witch moves towards Midnight now, and Midnight is suddenly very interested in her nails, that have been painted by the witch; crimson and vermillion, glittering like dark blood on her hands.

Jae-Ho hates how the witch walks, fluid and every turn of his head, every little twist of his fingers: a waltz, a dance with a hidden melody that nobody knew. The witch bears a vampiric grace as he walks, as weightless as air. He dashes through the dark and the light, disguising himself as both as he does an effortless dance to the beat of his heart (if he even _has_ one, that is).

(The witch might have a heart.)  
(It just hasn't beaten in a while.)

Blood bursts like roses in the witch's wake, a feral and bestial hunger currently sated... but it will come back one day, and Jae-Ho knows that the day it does. They will die.

The witch has a thing, Jae-Ho realises, to dress Midnight up. He likes her all dolled up, and Jae-Ho fears the worst. He fears for a lust that the witch might hide, he fears that the witch will touch her in ways that could scar, and he fears for Midnight's innocence. But yet, Midnight doesn't seem to mind how the witch uses a slender finger to apply cherry gloss on her lips, how gently he strokes glittered carmine onto her eyelids, how the witch tickles glowing aureate onto her cheeks. She says he doesn't always make her do it, only when he thinks she'd like it, or he finds something that would suit her.

"Midnight-ah," he says, holding her chin between his fingers, and the pearls that hang from his ears glisten and shine with a lustrous glow, swaying with every breath he took. "I'll call you outside in a minute, dearest jewel. You talk to your friend, hmm?" The witch turns around, already heading towards the door. "I'll give you both a moment."

The witch is gone and Jae-Ho can finally breathe properly.

"Midnight, Midnight," Jae-Ho says, watching as Midnight comes over with a plate of lemon-meringue pie.

"Yeah?"

"Midnight, everytime I ask you this question, he takes you away," says Jae-Ho in a frenzied rush, and he's about to open his mouth but Midnight beats him to it.

"Before you ask, he's not mean, he's not cruel. Not to me. He hasn't tried anything on me," Midnight tells him. "He's actually quite nice, even I was scared at first that he'd... y'know. But he didn't, he feeds me sweets and gives me pretty clothes. He says he'll let me play in the forest if I want, but that's only if we're both good." Midnight adds, "It could be a hundred times worse."

 _It could._ And Jae-Ho is thankful that the witch is kind to Midnight.

Midnight thinks back to how the witch had treated her. _Kindly_ , she thinks. He had almost seemed impeccably fond of her. He had noticed every little thing about her, her little habits, her little tendencies, everything. He had smiled at her, braided her hair, given her gentle reassurances, and even little pecks on the hair.

"We're leaving," Jae-Ho decides to say instead, snapping Midnight out of those memories and Midnight splutters incoherently.

"You're absolutely mad- we can't just- I promised- Are you mad?"

"Positively mad, but we are _not_ staying here. _You_ are not staying here." Jae-Ho pauses and looks at Midnight sternly. "I don't know what is keeping us alive right now, I don't know what he sees in you when he looks at you like that but the minute it's gone. We'll both die."

"You could go. When you get all better and all," Midnight says, her gaze skittish and her eyes wide and tense.

"No. Both of us. It's always been the both of us. We're both getting out of here."

Midnight's eyes look wild in their fear, she curves her lip into another sad smile. "You're just worried he'll hurt me if you leave, he won't, I just know he won't. As long as I play with him. I'll be fine, I'll be..." A slight hesitation. "I'll be happy and you can go catch... unicorns."

"Yeah, then I'll cut off a unicorn's horn and stab him with it," Jae-Ho says casually, Midnight looks at him with a done-expression but tears glisten and sparkle in her eyes, remaining unshed. Jae-Ho grabs her hands as tight as he can. "Both of us. Or neither of us. You're my best friend, the most important person in the entire world. I'm not leaving without you, if I ever do." He grins at her and pinches her nose. "I'm coming back with an invasion force."

"Jae-Ho, I can't leave, he's a witch, he'll find us aga–"

Jae-Ho finds himself grabbing the back of her head, and he slams his lips harsh against hers. He presses his suede-soft lips harder against her own pillowy ones, and molten stars explode in his heart as a searing fire hit his heart as she let him slip his tongue in. He feels Midnight's hands tangle themselves in his hair as he uses a hot, hungry mouth to devour hers.

A soft, feathery sound is released from Midnight, and Jae-Ho has to break away from the deep kiss of hungry passion to take a sip of breath, but their foreheads stay locked together, and he murmurs words lightly into her mouth. "I'll never leave you alone, never," he says, absolutely breathless. "I promised, didn't I? To stay with you no matter what."

Jae-Ho kisses her again, but this time, void of any hunger, just a desire to hold her closer, to have her warmth chase away the worry. This time, it's quick and marzipan-sweet.

"I love you," he says, and just before he can say anything else, the witch's voice calls for Midnight, and a few seconds later the door opens to reveal the witch in his magnificent glory.

He looks between Jae-Ho and Midnight, eyes flickering to the slight swell of their lips, and then he looks right at Midnight. "C'mon, Midnight," he beckons with a smile on his face.

"Okay," she replies quietly and squeezes Jae-Ho's shoulder comfortingly, whispering to him that she has to leave. As she walks beside the witch, the witch rests his hand on her shoulder and Jae-Ho wants to cut off his hands with a chainsaw, _no,_ a knife.

When they come back inside, the witch has his hands on Midnight's back – a bit too low for Jae-Ho's own liking, and he helps her wring out the muck in her hands. "Ew," says Midnight wiping off muck from her hands, making a gagging sound at the revolting sight of what she believes to be shit. "Is that shit? It looks like shit," she says to Jae-Ho who shrugs with a little grin on his face.

The witch shakes his head in answer. "Still dirt," he says fondly.

When the witch is cooking, Midnight unconsciously finds herself putting her hands on his shoulders, having to tip-toe as high as she can to look past the witch's broad frame. The witch's shoulders go rigid for a second, tense and panicked, but then they relax. And he laughs as if he's genuinely charmed by Midnight's fascination

"What are you making?" she asks him, but she practically squeals as the witch picks her up by her waist and sets her on the kitchen counter.

"How about you just sit and wait, dearest jewel?" the witch says, but it in general sounds like a suggestion, not an order. Midnight nods and swings her legs on the counter, at some point kicking the witch who looks at Midnight's panicked eyes and only smiles, continuing his work.

"Are you one thousand, four hundred and forty-six years old?" she asks the witch while they eat, tucking in at dinner.

"Nope," the witch says, popping the 'p', and he heaps a generous amount of hot curry into Midnight's plate. "Precious Midnight, you aren't going to stop trying to guess my age, are you?"

His voice is fond, dripping with sugar and sweetness, so much sugar and sweetness that Jae-Ho hopes he gets diabetes from it and dies.

Midnight despite sounding jovial and chipper, hides the terror behind her eyes as she speaks to the witch, "Well am I close, are you older and younger?"

"How old do I look to you?" the witch asks.

"You look twenty-six at most."

 _He looks like a retarded mongo,_ Jae-Ho wants to seethe out at the witch. The witch is a bloody bastard and they are at this witch's mercy, and Jae-Ho loathes it _so very much_.

"Well I can assure you that the former number you stated is nowhere close to my age," the witch tells her.

"So you're older?"

"Yes," the witch says and goes silent, not willing to say much more.

Midnight in general looks stunned and seems to be questioning life, and even Jae-Ho tries his best not to ogle at that but as the witch looks up feeling his gaze; and the witch's handsome face contorts into that of a smug one, and he smirks with an arched brow.

Jae-Ho's goes to rip every single hair off his head and make sure he bleeds. And Jae-Ho especially wants to rip out the witch's guts and organs and every single vein in the witch's heart as he places a tender kiss on Midnight's cheek.

Her silver orbs look intimidated and panic-stricken and they flit to Jae-Ho for help, the black orbs stare back at Midnight with that same sincerity, not at all minding Midnight's jitteriness. "Eat well precious jewel," _Don't call her that -_ Jae-Ho wants to spit out. "And come sit with me when you're done, I'd like some of your help."

After supper is done, Midnight sits on the floor cross-legged beside the witch who sits in a chair by the fireplace. She watches with wide and rounded eyes as the witch shows her something magical, it seems as if the witch has trapped a star in a jar and is pulling exquisite silver thread from it; and the thread glows luminously, and Midnight spins it onto the spool.

"Where do you get this stuff from?" she asks the witch who simply smiles in a secret.

"Can you weave anything from anything?"

"Yes."

"Can your magic be taught to a normal human?"

"It can."

"Could you teach me?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't want to."

"Why don't you?"

"You'd use it against me."

"No I won't."

"If you don't, he will."

"How about if you–"

"Ask another question and I'll throw you off a building." Yet when the witch says it, Jae-Ho can see that he doesn't mean it, that he doesn't mean that as the corner of his lips tug up into a smile.

Jae-Ho doesn't understand, he really doesn't understand why the witch smiles so happy when Midnight asks questions about every little thing about his magic and this place; he doesn't understand why the witch strokes her hair and laughs when she asks if she can eat something; he doesn't understand the witch at all.

"Midnight-ah, I'd like to ask you some questions," says the witch, Midnight stills for a moment, and then smiles.

"You and the thief," begins the witch, and Jae-Ho stills for a split second as he pretends to sleep in his bed. "Are you close?"

"Very," answers Midnight shortly.

"How close? How far does your relationship go?" the witch pries, and Jae-Ho glances at the witch's expression, and he sees absolutely no emotion on the witch's face.

"What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean."

"Will he get in trouble?" asks Midnight, suddenly quiet.

"...No"

"It doesn't go very far past hugs," lies Midnight. She was always a good liar.

"Don't lie to me." She should've been good enough. "I know–"

"If you know, why do you ask?" she says, looking up at him, and Jae-Ho sees it: a challenge. "Why ask if you already know, witch?" No, not a challenge... curiousity. "Why do you care?" she asks him gently.

"You belong to me," he says. "I don't appreciate sharing." Then he adds, "As for asking, I don't like making assumptions. So, are my suspicions correct?"

"I'm afraid your suspicions are wrong," she says calmly – she spoke different when she was scared, Jae-Ho knows.

There were two types of afraid with Midnight, the first one being where she couldn't speak properly: stumbling and stammering, incoherent sentences with tears streaming down her face. The second being where she was deathly silent, and when she spoke, it would seem dark and threatening, a way of hiding fear, she would change the way she talks, make herself calm and composed, hide away her true thoughts, keep herself locked away for awhile.

_"My parents taught me," her twelve-year-old voice echoes in Jae-Ho's head. "Indirectly, of course. they taught me to hide your own fear and disguise it as another emotion, so no one would ever suspect you."  
"How could they indirectly teach you that?"  
"They disguised their fear as anger, and I had to face the consequences of their fear."  
"Why were they scared?"  
Jae-Ho still remembers Midnight's sad smile. "Me, they were afraid of me."_

"Well how could that be?"

"Maybe because you're super old, and your brain died at some point."

"Are you calling me stupid?"

"Thuh-that's not what I meant, you just twisted that."

"Well, I asked my question, do you have any that aren't about magic?"

"...Family, do you have any family?"

The witch is quiet for a moment.

Then he speaks, "A brother." He smiles in memory. "Little brother, a few decades younger than me. His name was... Yoongi, we were half-brothers, so his name was Min Yoongi." The witch laughs in another memory. "He acted cool in front of other people, but then he'd be all whiny and baby-like with me." Then the witch's smile fades. "Then he fell in love, with a fucking human, the fucking diseased insect killed my little brother the minute he found out what he was, where he came from."

The witch has his hand on the blade of his knife, his hand wrapped around the knife and he squeezes on it, and blood gushes down his hand, but he doesn't seem to care. Midnight seems concerned for the witch, yet Jae-Ho feels zero sympathy for the cruel man.

"Witch," Midnight says softly, removing the knife gently from his hands. "Don't do that, you'll hurt yourself," she speaks lowly and Jae-Ho smiles knowing Midnight's nature: _"No matter who they are, help them, no matter what. Don't be as bad as them," she told Jae-Ho when she saved the boy who used to bully her_.

The witch doesn't seem to hear and continues, "My little brother loved him so fucking much, and I had told him that the fucking rat would hurt him, I fucking told him." The witch's face falls for a split second before rearranging itself into a sneer. "Yet he never listened. And I never saw him again."

Midnight listens, the witch knows and Jae-Ho knows, she's listening to every word. Her eyes filled with sadness and she holds his bloodied hand with her, and Jae-Ho can only watch silently with wide eyes as the witch's blood covers her hand.

"Because the mortal killed him," growls the witch. "He fucking killed my little brother, my little Yoongi."

The witch cared once, Jae-Ho realises. But not anymore.

And Jae-Ho thinks for a second, what he would do if anyone had done the same to Midnight. No, he doesn't need to think, he knows: he would become a monster.

"What did you do?" asks Midnight quietly, and Jae-Ho sees how she strokes the witch's hands with svelte fingers.

"I found him, I knew what he looked like, I knew his name," says the witch. "So I hunted for him, it took less than an hour to find the bastard. And I killed him, then I bought him back, then I killed him again. I did it over and over and _over_ , just so he knows what my pain feels like, just so he knows that he took away the only person I ever loved." Jae-Ho can see that same sinister, blood-curdling smile adorning the witch's face, and those obsidian eyes twinkling and shimmering at the thought of blood and death and corpses. "I killed him yesterday as well, bought him back again today. I'll never stop. Never."

Midnight blanches for a moment, but she quickly fixes the anxious expression on her face. Then the witch's scowl disappears and is instead replaced with a smile. He removed his bloodied hand from Midnight's gentle hold (reluctantly, Jae-Ho notes) and he grabs both of them, placing a kiss on her hands.

Then Jae-Ho knows that he shouldn't be watching this moment, he shouldn't because it feels intimate, secret, something that he shouldn't know that happened.

"Dearest jewel, please don't be scared of me, please not of me." The witch shows his hands to Midnight, no cut, no gash. "That's not what I want. I don't want to have to hurt you, I don't want to have to scare you into obeying this one rule I have set for you." The witch smiles again, and places another kiss between her brows. "Please don't leave."

Then the witch stands, and the smile is gone. His face goes blank, and he looks down at Midnight. He grabs hold of her wrists and pulls her up with impeccable strength. "It's late, precious. Sleep now, and forget what I have told you."

The witch does something and the blood from Midnight's hands is cleared, and Midnight looks bedazzled, the witch laughs – rich and sinister, and Jae-Ho recalls what Midnight told him. _"Even when he's genuinely laughing, he laughs dark and cool, he just has a super scary and cool laugh."_

"Goodnight, my love," he says, and he's gone.

Jae-Ho had discussed the plan with Midnight when the witch had went to go fetch something from the garden. After a few moments wait, any sign of the witch's return doesn't come.

He breathes in and out, and he ignores the fear that claws at him.

"I'm ready," Midnight whispers, and they're both out.

Out the witch's house, out of the witch's garden, and Jae-Ho doesn't realise that he stole from the witch once again.

Jae-Ho looks back at the house, and he laughs gleefully.

(NEVER LOOK BACK YOU FOOL!)

They slow down for a second after so much running, unaware of the figure with the pipe in his hands that watches them. And Jae-Ho sees the look on Midnight's face: guilt.

"Why do you look so sad?" asks Jae-Ho, bending down to Midnight's height, he strokes her hair and presses a chaste kiss to her lips. "What's wrong?"

"The witch... he... I don't think we should've left," says Midnight. "He's not bad, Jae-Ho. I can see it. And I bet if I convinced him, he wouldn't hurt yo–"

"Midnight," growls Jae-Ho. "Please don't tell me you feel pity for that monster."

"I... Jae-Ho... It's not that, it's just that... He's not what you think, he's not mean, he's not cruel. He can love," says Midnight softly. "Jae-Ho, we should go back."

"Why? Why the fuck should we go back?" asks Jae-Ho, his lips curving into a livid sneer.

"He set one rule, Jae-Ho: Don't leave. That's... It's not hard... We could just–"

"She's right," says a voice, and they both whip around to see the cloaked figure of the Piper. "You should go back before it's too late. I won't tell him." The Piper hides his face behind the mask he wears, his flute dangling loosely from his hands. The Piper looks at Midnight, taking off his hood. "Hurting you will be his biggest regret, go back."

"A witch's love is more dangerous than a witch's anger," spits Jae-Ho, remembering his mother's words, and so he takes Midnight's hand and runs.

"Jae-Ho!" Midnight screams.

"I'm not losing you! Not to him!" he screeches back at her, and Midnight understands, even though the strings of her heart also pull her towards the witch's cottage.

They run and run and run and run and _runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrun._ Until the trees sway around them and a dizzying sense of vertigo makes the ground spin and spin and spin and _spinspinspinspinspinspin._ It's been hours but the forest never ends.

(Careful Jae-Ho, somebody watches you.)

(Careful. Careful. Careful.)

( _Careful_ ~)

The trees screech in anger.

(He's coming.)

Jae-Ho can feel the powerful presence of the witch coming closer, he can _feel_ it, and the trees roar as well, mimicking the witch's anger.

(He's coming.)

(He's coming. He's getting closer.)

(RUN!)

The witch stands in front of them.

In the morning, he is gorgeous. In the night, he is a monster.

His beauty is mutant, hideous and gruesome. His snarl is spine-chilling and menacing and burns Jae-Ho and Midnight's minds, agonising their souls.

He is terrifying when calm, he's indescribable when enraged.

(Death all over again.)

Midnight screams as the witch sibilates an ancient curse of utter agony, a mortifying pain sears through Jae-Ho's entire body and he falls to the ground, writhing and screeching in heart-rending moribundity. Jae-Ho screams in agony as billions of hot non-existent knives seem to pierce through him – whatever curse the witch has shrieked courses through Jae-Ho like razors through his veins, through every little capillary he has.

Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain. Pain.

He wants to die.

Midnight is begging and pleading with the witch, slick orbs of crystal are rolling down her cheek (or perhaps it's the thundering storm clouds that flick down needle-like drops from the sky).

Midnight begs and pleads and beseeches with the witch. She grabs onto his face, cupping it, forcing his attention down on her. "Please, please, please!" The witch looks down at her, his eyes cold. "Please, please, please! Stop it! You're hurting him! Stop it, please!" She fists the witch's jacket, but the witch continues hissing out his curse. "Listen to me! Listen! Please!" she screeches. "It was my idea, not his! It's my fault, okay? My fault, my fault, my fault–" Jae-Ho screams and cries, and Midnight feels her heart break when he calls out for his mother. "Witch! Puh-please, I'm begging you... Hurt me instead! LISTEN TO ME! HURT ME INSTEAD!"

The witch's dark eyes are livid with rage and his lips curl back over his gritted teeth into a haunting scowl, his jaw clenched so hard Midnight could almost hear the dull creak of his bones.

"Witch! Please!" She grabs his face, forcing his attention on her, and just as she's about to speak, she feels the witch's hands tangling in her hair, and a hot pain courses through the back of her skull as the witch wrenches her hair back.

He stops his chanting for a moment, his eyes trailing the crystalline tears falling out of Midnight's eyes, and Midnight sees it: The inner turmoil in the witch's eyes, the broken smile and pained eyes.

"Please," she whispers, and then that little twinkle in the witch's eyes is gone.

"You bought this upon yourself," he gnars to her, and Jae-Ho's screaming and wails start again.

He grabs Midnight roughly by her wrist; his grip unwavering and vice-like. He grabs them both, and he drags them all the way back to that wretched cursed house that they both detest so much.

The witch leaves Jae-Ho to writhe in throes of torment and indescribable pain, paroxysms of raw pain and anguish and resentment fill him up, and he feels hot tears falling out of his eyes as he begs for the excruciating pain to stop.

The witch himself is dragging Midnight upstairs, throwing her into the hall, his voice powerful and booming as he screeches at her; something Jae-Ho can't make sense of.

The door slams shut and it's around daytime that Midnight staggers back into the living room, looking as if she'd just seen Death himself and the witch smiles at this.

"Do it again and I will kill you," the witch seethes at Jae-Ho, stopping the wretched pain and agony and Jae-Ho can finally breathe.

The witch is all soft and sweet fondness again as the light of day seeps inside.

Jae-Ho sputters and wheezes in air greedily, gulping it down, feeling his body go to jelly; finally no longer tense and writhing.

Midnight's lungs seize and she flinches as the witch stops in front of her, he looks down with a straight face, but then it turns mournful as the back of his hand gently falls down her face and he whispers, so very low that Jae-Ho finds that it's magic he heard it, "I didn't want to, my love."

Midnight simply starts crying and the witch looks, just for a split-moment, as if he were going to hug her. But he ascends upstairs instead, deciding against it.

Midnight runs to Jae-Ho, helping him up as Jae-Ho gasps and sputters for air, and she crushes Jae-Ho into a tight hug, crying woefully and Jae-Ho does the same. Midnight pulls away and Jae-Ho can see the self-loathing in her eyes as she looks at the bruises and blood that splatter Jae-Ho's face and body.

"I'm suh-so sorry," she lets out, and she breaks down.

Jae-Ho can't find himself speaking, mouth and tongue too heavy to move, so he leaves an open-mouthed and desperate kiss on her lips. "Nnnn, duh-don't cry," he stammers out. "Ih-It's okay."

Midnight kisses back, bruising and sorrowful, a haunting pain to the move of her lips. Jae-Ho gasps between the messy kiss that is all agony and cries, and he locks them together properly and he feels his own tears mingling with the mess of their mouths.

"I'm sorry," she says as they break apart, and he feels the rapid beat of Midnight's heart.

They stay like that for awhile, silently crying in eachother's arms, until Jae-Ho asks, "What... What did he... to you?"

"Um, there... He- he made me clean upstairs. Uh-all the rooms."

"Tha- That's it, no more?" Jae-Ho says, sighing in relief.

"There were so many rooms, so many of them... Too- Too many, too many rooms Jae-Ho." Midnight rambles, stuttering and tripping over her words. "There were, there were books and thuh-they had terrifying pictures on them. There were juh-jars with hearts and lungs in them, duh-dead children. I begged him to let me back down buh-but he wouldn't! Then- Then there was a room, nuh-not a room... A torture chuh-chamber and all the tuh-tools were dirty and I huh-had to clean them buh-but there was a person in there, huh-his name was Hoseok and I-I think he's thuh-the one who the witch's brother fell in luh-love with. He kuh-kept screaming at me to help him and the- the witch tortured him in front of me." Midnight is suddenly very still and starts shaking and holding her head. "I cuh-couldn't do it, I couldn't! I wanted you, I wuh-want to go home! I want to die, I wanna be anywhere but here! Please Jae-Ho, don't let him take me away, please please please, I'm begging you I-"

"Midnight! Midnight! It's okay."

(It's not.)

He envelopes her again.

"Oh god, I'm so sorry, Gem. I'm so, so sorry."

"Please don't let him. Please."

(Never run again because you looked back.)

**"Jae-Ho hates the witch when he does anything at all~"**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Random Person: Oh, you write fanfiction? *snickers when I nod* So you write ugly pieces and unrealistic romance for someone who doesn't even exist or know you exist?  
> Me:... I guess you could say that, I mean, my story's about a dude and this girl he likes, and the dude meets a witch and bargains with the witch for shit, and... You'd never understand.
> 
> Soooooo, that was terrifyingly fun. Did you guys enjoy it, please tell me if you do and what do you think will happen? Hehe, I had tons of seizures writing this, I hope you had some reading this. What genre would you call this story? Gothic? Dark Fantasy? Mystery? Thriller? Sci-Fi? Historic? Fantasy? All of them? When I tell you that writing this story is so hard, I mean it! I've already had to cut out so many scenes and the characters... The character part is hard because I wanna give y'all more of the characters without making it boring, especially Midnight. A writer knows everything about their characters, they know how their characters tick. But putting that into words that are potent and beautiful and compelling to read is sooooo~ hard! Because Midnight in my head is a funny girl who is clumsy, cries when she gets scared and cares way too much and sees the good in people no matter how bad they are. And when I finally managed to get her persona through, I'd have to cut out the scene because I had revealed too much and thought the scene would work better as a flashback for later chapters! The witch is meant to be confusing, even I don't understand why I made him the way he is, he's just... like that. And Jae-Ho, Jae-Ho amuses me quite a lot in this! He's always think of ways to kill the witch and get tf outta there! Tell me who's your fav char. so far! If you think anything may be unrealistic in this – like, heavily unrealistic, please tell me (other than the magic beings) and if you see plot-holes, tell meh!


	6. An Enchanting Beauty, Echoing Words and New Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Those enchanting nymphs dancing and glide across the water, the water tinkling with a jewel glow, as those alluring and enthralling fairies and nymphs play in the water. They sparkle and glitter in colours of peach and tangerine and cosmic-blue, and Midnight looks around in wonder to see the splendor of little flies that have lambent lights the colours of rosepetal-pink and duck-egg blue, they float around sluggishly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> //This chapter's on the much more... majestic side? Like, kind of happier than other chapters? Like, it kind of made me soft, and I hope you enjoy this other glimpse of the forest, in the chapter after the next chapter, we'll explore the forest much more as well, alongside the witch's and Midnight's relationships with the people in the forest!//
> 
> I listened to this one song on repeat:  
> [BTS (방탄소년단) LOVE YOURSELF 轉 Tear 'Singularity' ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8npDG2ulKQ)

**Chapter Five: The One Who Stole From The Witch's Garden - Part 5**

"But I suppose that makes you my odd, strange, sweet witch."  
"하지만 그게 너를 내 이상하고 이상한 달콤한 마녀로 만드는 것 같아."

**IT'S BEEN ODD** ever since they tried to run away. Jae-Ho would say marrow-freezing and daunting. The witch is always too silent, his eyes too filled with grief when Midnight flinches from his voice, his lips going downward into a broken smile when Midnight goes stock-still underneath his touch. The witch seems sad.

He lets Jae-Ho work alongside Midnight now, deeming Jae-Ho strong enough to do chores, but Jae-Ho wonders if it's because it'll make Midnight happier. And now Jae-Ho breathes sickly and cloying sugar every day of his life.

The witch has them make saccharine and soul-nourishing treats, and Jae-Ho breathes nougat, ganache and meringue now. But Midnight enjoys the crystallised apples and frosted cherries, pressing the caramel and peppermint sweets to his lips.

Right now, Jae-Ho and Midnight make many different things together. Midnight places the candied clemintine's segments alongside the glacè cherries on the buttercream icing, which all sits on the very top of a delicious vinalla sponge.

Midnight is silent as she works, and Jae-Ho glances to make sure the witch won't be coming back in anytime soon. "Midnight-ah," he says, and presses the front of his body to her back. He wraps both his arms around her stomach, setting his chin on the curve of her shoulder.

He feels Midnight relax underneath his touch, and she places her hand right above his, using her other hand to cradle his cheek. "Careful, Jae-Ho, he could come in and-"

"Shhh, don't worry about him," he whispers to her, placing a little kiss on the angle of her jaw. "You've been so quiet, talk to me," he whines.

"What do you want me to say?" she asks him with a tranquil laugh.

"Anything! Just talk to me." But she doesn't, and Jae-Ho knows he does it on purpose. "If you don't talk to me... I'll... I'll kiss you!"

She snorts. "You think I'll complain about that?"

"In front of the witch," he says with a little grin, and Midnight stills at the mention of the witch.

"Midnight... Did he do something else to you up there? I know you, you wouldn't have gotten so... scared, not that easily, not you," he says honestly.

It had been nagging him day and night that the witch had done more, _more_ than just showing her a cursed room.

"... He didn't do anything, Jae-Ho, don't worry yourself," she tells him, and she removes Jae-Ho's hands to face him, and she gives him a reassuring smile.

"But-"

Jae-Ho doesn't have time to finish his sentence because Midnight snakes her arms around his neck, goes onto the very tip of her toes, and slams her lips against his. For a split second, Jae-Ho is surprised before his eyes close in a euphoric cloud of bliss. He slithers his arms around her waist, pressing her closer to him, so that any space between them is gone.

With a feeling of felicity, he moulds their mouths harder together, and he moves his tongue sensually in Midnight's mouth. He finds utopia in those sugar-plum lips, and can only press his lips harshly against hers to get _more_.

His teeth are just about to gnash on her lips when the door begins to creak open, and Jae-Ho quickly places one peck on her lips before returning back into normal positon. When Jae-Ho glances upwards, he finds himself smirking at the pink blush on Midnight's cheeks. 

The witch enters, silent as snow and frost. "Midnight... Would you like to go outside?" he asks, voice penetrating and wintry, but his eyes look hopeful. "To the forest..." The witch hesitates before he says, "The thief can join you, if you'd like that."

Jae-Ho looks at Midnight, who turns to the witch and nods in agreement. "Would you like to go now or... later?"

"When would 'later' be?" asks Midnight, looking fully at the witch for the first time in a week.

"At evening," informs the witch. "The forest is beautiful either way."

"Could we go later then?" asks Midnight, and the witch nods with a content smile.

"As you wish." Then the witch adds, "There are some people who would like to meet you."

Midnight tilts her head curiously but the witch only smiles. "Midnight, get some roses for me, I'd like to show you how to make something."

Midnight nods, and leaves. Jae-Ho instantly glares at the witch the minute Midnight's presence had left. "What the fuck?" spits Jae-Ho.

"Excuse me?" says the witch, eyes chilling Jae-Ho to the bone, and a scowl adorns his handsome face.

"I don't understand you, what the fuck do you want from her?" snarls Jae-Ho, lips bending down into an unpleasant sneer.

"I'd answer your question if you could at least word it properly," hisses the witch, a serpentine look on his face.

"You like her, don't you?" The witch doesn't blink. "She won't like you back, you're a witch. She'll never love you. You've scared her too much, you've-"

"I've not hurt her, have I? Scared her, yes, but I haven't hurt her, not the way I did to you." The witch glowers at Jae-Ho. "I have given her everything she needs and everything above, everything except freedom. And I will give her that soon enough, too. Hell, I gave her that before you even woke up. If it wasn't for you, she would be able to do whatever she wants."

"Well, my question is... Why? Why ask her what she wants? Why-?"

"Ever heard of destined soulmates?" says the witch suddenly, and Jae-Ho's blood goes frigid. "A little unknown fact about witches is that we have soulmates, as do demons, as do werewolves."

"She's not-"

A scream from outside stops the raging fire between the witch and Jae-Ho. Jae-Ho and the witch look at eachother for a split second, and the same name flashes in their eyes: Midnight. They both rush outside, slamming everything to the side, and for once, both men frantically look around to see what's wrong.

"Midnight!" calls Jae-Ho, but then he hears laughter.

The witch grabs Jae-Ho's wrist, dragging him towards the sound, and Jae-Ho finds himself surprised by the witch's actions. "Midnight?" the witch calls out, voice ringing in the air.

The witch is quick to find the location of Midnight's bubbling laughter, and sitting in a whole valley of sublime flowers, is Midnight.

She's holding an executioner-black wolf in her arms, the wolf is stunning in every way possible – Its fur is gleaming and azalea-soft, its eyes are captivating in everyway possible, entrancing with the colour of paradise-green; glowing and glittering with intelligence and warmth.

The witch laughs pleasantly at the sight. The wolf is much more larger than the normal wolf, Jae-Ho notices, with sinewy shoulders. The wolf plays with Midnight, paws on her chest as the wolf licks her face and nuzzles her jaw.

Midnight laughs, playing with the wolf's mottled fur, and leaving little kisses on its nose.

"I see that Nabi likes you," the witch says, and Midnight only hugs the wolf in response to this. "I hadn't expected that."

The wolf leaps off Midnight, nudging her up, and Midnight complies to the wolf. The wolf wraps itself around Midnight, licking at her ankles now, and Midnight whines that it tickles.

"He's so sweet," says Midnight, hand stroking the wolf's snout, and she smiles genuinely – no fear, no sadness – for the first time in a week. "I'm suh-sorry if I alarmed you, witch. He came out of nowhere and jumped on me, and I kind of got scared."

"That's alright, precious."

But then the wolf looks up at the witch, and then at Jae-Ho. And for a second, Jae-Ho feels something Greek-fire warm pull at the strings of his heart, and he smells something that isn't there – something intoxicating and potent. The wolf comes over to Jae-Ho, who kneels down, finding himself hypnotised and charmed by the wolf's eyes.

The witch's eyes go wide for a second, and he smirks knowingly. Midnight gives the witch a questioning look, to which he replies with a wink. Jae-Ho finds himself smiling as the wolf pounces on him too, throwing him backwards.

"Hey! That tickles!" he exclaims as the wolf leaves ticklish licks on his jaw and mouth.

As Jae-Ho is giving all his attention to the wolf that has a whirlwind of emotions clouding those eyes, Jae-Ho doesn't notice Midnight and the witch.

"The thief is quite cute when he's not being his annoying self," says the witch, slipping beside Midnight.

"He's always cute," says Midnight, and then she picks up something from the floor. "Your... Your roses, by the way."

"Thank you," the witch says, face absolutely cold as he's taking the basket out of Midnight's sweet hands. "Midnight dearest?"

Midnight looks up at the witch, who looks right back down into those eyes he had fallen in love with. "Do you believe in soulmates?"

"I think... Yes... Yes, I think they-they do exist. I believe in them." Midnight smiles slightly, slight stammer in her words. "I think, sometimes you don't realise that they're your soulmate, but when you do, it all makes sense. What about you?"

The witch doesn't answer, instead places his hand on her waist, and watch as the wolf leaves them all, running faster than ever into the forest.

Jae-Ho looks rather upset at the wolf's absence. "I see the thief likes the werewolf," the witch says, letting go of Midnight's waist.

"A wuh-werewolf?" stutters Jae-Ho.

The witch doesn't answer, instead calls them back inside, holding the basket of roses in his hands.

It's evening, and the witch calls for them both.

"Thief, Midnight," he acknowledges both of them, and when they come close enough, the witch blows something gold on their face.

Jae-Ho feels himself slipping into darkness, and the last thing he sees is the witch's diamond-flame silver eyes.

"Midnight-ah."

Midnight wakes up to those enchanting, nebulous eyes looking down on her. She feels the witch's face so incredibly close to her own, and she feels a soft bed of leaves underneath her. The witch has a hand a finger gently tracing her hair as he pulls her up, and she sees Jae-Ho beside her, fluttering his eyes open.

The witch's face is truly masked since Midnight met him, truly masked, a mask where not one emotion flickered across his gorgeous face. Midnight looks around, and the place looks vaguely familiar to her... The place from her dreams, and the witch is truly right, the forest is always beautiful.

"Huh?" comes Jae-Ho's voice from beside her.

Those enchanting nymphs dancing and glide across the water, the water tinkling with a jewel glow, as those alluring and enthralling fairies and nymphs play in the water. They sparkle and glitter in colours of peach and tangerine and cosmic-blue, and Midnight looks around in wonder to see the splendor of little flies that have lambent lights the colours of rosepetal-pink and duck-egg blue, they float around sluggishly.

The effulgence of the forest is a blossoming paradise in the night that is ever so sublime. Then Midnight sees more of them come out from the trees, fairies chiming and ringing with a symphonic song, and Midnight plays with them.

She looks at two particular fairies who nuzzle the tip of her finger, and Midnight has the most bedazzling and jubiliant smile on her pulchritudinous face. She looks at their vivid luminosity and Eden-green skin, decorated with the tinest of flowers and fluid clothes.

Then come another few fairies, holding a flower crown of luscious flowers that sit pretty on her head, and Midnight thanks them. Then she looks at the witch, who smiles the slightest in his nectarous way, and then Midnight sees it: the fear in the creatures eyes as they look at the witch.

"Play, do as you wish," coaxes the witch soothingly, and Midnight sits down, watching in awe as they dance in the large pond. Jae-Ho looks at Midnight as well, entranced, but not by the beauty of the forest. Like the witch, he is entranced by the raw beauty and happiness of Midnight.

Midnight feels eyes on her, somewhere in the pond that seems to be much more deeper than it looks. Midnight looks at the witch who smiles the slightest bit in reassurance. "Nothing will happen to you as long as I'm here," he says. "Wander as far as you'd like."

So Midnight starts to walk around the pond, and then she sees it: a tail, the size of human legs, clinquant and glistening; and a human upper body, chiseled and muscular, a flamboyant mix of beauty and water.

Then she sees the figure move away from her, and then the figures comes out the water, revealing a... siren. A siren absolutely stunning. A face with a bronzed complexion, skin unblemished and glowing with sunlight that isn't there. With mystical, sultry eyes that are hypnotising and alluring in their enticing, constellation-silver eyes with hints of orchid-pink in them. His hair is nougat-brown with streaks of magenta, and his full lips are succulent, sensuous and velour-soft.

"Hello," the siren croons with an almost fond smile, leaning against the wooden plank in the water, his head resting on his elbows. "You must be Midnight," he says with a syrup sweet voice. "You're very pretty."

"Thank you," she says with awe in her voice. "You're very beautiful as well."

The siren laughs, charming and dazzling, and he comes closer, dangerously closer. He comes so close that he raises a melon-sweet hand to stroke her cheek. "Careful, Taehyun," says the witch, a warning edge to his tone. "She can't swim, so don't think of pulling her in."

"I wouldn't do that," giggles Taehyun, and he pays attention to Midnight once again. "I'm Taehyun, Park Taehyun. Some people call me Alejandro though. It's an absolute pleasure meeting you, Midnight," says the siren, elegantly shaking the hand of Midnight. "He talks of you often," Taehyun says, gesturing towards the witch who stays stony-faced instead. "I can see why."

"If you're done with your flirting," begins the witch, and Taehyun's eyes instantly bow down in respect. "Then I'd like for you to take care of her, I need to check on Nabi. Keep her safe for as long as I'm gone." Then the witchs adds, "Don't disappoint me."

"I would never."

The witch only turns, and his shadow disappears into the forest. It's quiet for a few moments, and then the siren speaks ever so quietly to them both. "Is he nice to you, dearest friend?"

"Yes," says Midnight. "He's nice, as long as we don't try to leave."

"What becomes his can't leave the forest," laughs the siren casually.

" _His_?" questions Jae-Ho, sour curve to his lip. "What does that mean?"

"She sold herself to the witch in return for your life, just like the Piper sold himself for me," the siren says, smiling remaining on his face, and Jae-Ho tracks back to the Piper's words. "The Piper is more than happy before you think you can coerce him into siding with you." The siren sighs.

"Truly, Jae-Ho. You must loosen up, let yourself free a tiny bit. All seriousness and no fun makes for a sad life." The siren's eyes glow faintly, but then it stops, as if the siren decides against it, and he says, "Don't think the witch bad, don't think him cruel. He truly isn't. He's a good man-"

"To be man, you have to be human," Jae-Ho says calmly.

"I understand your point, I really do. But beings like him have feelings." Then he looks at Midnight, ignoring Jae-Ho. "You understand." He looks at Midnight with gleeful hope in his eyes. "Do you feel that? Do you feel his heart? You feel it, I know you do. You feel his pain, his soul, and no matter what he'll do, you'll understand, and you'll forgive. Do you wanted to know why? That's what fated soulmates are, me and the Piper are-"

"Fated soulmates don't exist!" screeches Jae-Ho. "Love is built on years of trust and friendship and respect. Destiny doesn't tie two people together! Fate doesn't exist! All that exists is now! Do you fucking understand? It-"

"Please," the siren almost begs. "Me and the Piper, we watched him whilst you were in a coma, we watched him secretly, and I've never seen him smile so genuinely before, you can't just-"

"What's going on here?" a voice snaps them all out of their argument.

The siren starts stammering, panic evident in his eyes, and Jae-Ho's mouth only opens and moves around air. Midnight smiles, however, calm on top of all the fright. "We were talking about the Piper! Taehyun was telling me something about fated soulmates, but Jae-Ho here doesn't believe in them."

The witch laughs – dark and sinister, chilling in the night, yet it warms Midnight's heart. "Only a fool wouldn't believe in destiny, in fate, and you, dearest thief, are the biggest fool of all." The witch places a hand on Midnight hair, broad hand stroking little curly tendrils of ebony. Then he looks at the siren. "Piper calls for you."

"Oh!" he exclaims, and before he delves deep down into the waters, he places a kiss on Midnight's hand, looking sublime in his magnificent glory, and he whispers so quietly that even the witch can't hear, "Give him a chance, he's an amazing person."

Then the siren disappears, and it goes back to playing and laughing with the Ashrays that are almost like water ghosts, and Midnight strokes the tinkling water of its translucent skin. "Witch, where do they come from?" she asks curiously, but before the witch can answer there comes the cawing of a bird, high in the air, and Midnight shoots upwards. "Jae-Ho! Look! It's him! The bird I told you about!"

Jae-Ho stands up, and even the witch looks mildly confused. Midnight looks at the bird with the plumage of ebony and shimmer of emerald. Then the raven-bird comes down, to sit on Midnight's finger.

"You know him?" says the witch.

"Yes! Ever since I was little, he followed me!" she tells the witch excitedly, and Jae-Ho attempts to stroke the beak of the bird, but the bird snaps at his fingers, and Midnight giggles despite Jae-Ho's glower. "Pretty bird."

"Rèmy," calls the witch, and the bird flies over to the witch's shoulder.

"Rèmy?" questions Midnight, feeling a fairy set herself on her head while Midnight holds a water nymph in her free hand, a lilac pixie resting on her shoulder. "His name is Rèmy? Is he your pet? He's really sweet-"

"Not a pet, my precious jewel, but a friend." The witch does a little flick of his fingers, and there is a flicker of viridescent dust, and the bird that Midnight has known for all her life turns into a human, or something half-human.

"At your service, m'lady," says the bird– No, Rèmy.

"This is Rèmy, the dark faerie," introduces the witch.

Rèmy stands there in front of Midnight, towering over her with muscular yet slender build. His eyes are the colour of Eden and grape-green, divine and beautiful in their transient, mystical nature. His face is on the longer side, paste-white, a pretty contrast to his peach-coloured lips that seem succulent and sweet, and his bewitching face breaks into a cheeky yet fond grin. But that isn't what stuns both Midnight and Jae-Ho, it's the nebulous, black wings on his body that shocks them. His wings are feathery and silken, velour-soft, and absolutely megalithic.

"I've known you ever since you were little, little Midnight," he says, only smiling wider at Midnight's huge smile. Midnight has absolutely no conscience as she slams herself into him, wrapping her arms tight and warm around his bare torso.

Rèmy laughs, a throaty, deep sound as he wraps his arms around her figure. "Thank you," she whispers, "for keeping me safe." And Rèmy only smiles in response.

"Hmm, what's that, Midnight?" he asks, pointing far off somewhere, and Midnight peers at the brambles of bush and twig.

"What do you mean? I can't see-"

Midnight feels something wet and thick splatter harshly over her face, it smells... nice, but it feels icky and gooey, and she recognises it as wet, sludgy mud, and she sees who had thrown it: Rèmy. Rèmy cackles madly but gasps, absolutely shocked as Midnight throws it onto his face, and he gags on the mud as it goes into his mouth.

Jae-Ho snickers at the dark faerie, who in returns throws a ball of mud that splatters across Jae-Ho's chest, and then it begins. Midnight throwing sludge at Rèmy, Jae-Ho at Midnight, and Rèmy at Jae-Ho, and it's not soon that other creatures – short and unknown, join in on the fight, but it all goes downhill when Midnight aims sloppily at Jae-Ho, and it hits the witch's face instead.

Everything goes petrifyingly silent in the moment. The fairies and pixies go deathly silent, their chiming gone, and even Rèmy looks scared, but then it breaks as Midnight tries to maintain her giggles, and with a flick of the witch's fingers, an entire waterfall of disgusting mud attacks Midnight so that she falls backwards and is covered from head to toe in mud.

Everyone – including Midnight – bursts out laughing, and the witch laughs sincerely as well. As they continue to play, the witch silently watching sitting languidly on a tree, and he freezes as Midnight comes close to him.

"Midnight," he greets casually despite his thudding heart. "Is there a problem?"

The witch notices that Midnight had somehow managed to get some of the mud off her face, and a lot of it off her hands, and the witch can only suppose it was the pixie's doing. "There's mud on your face, aren't you going to take it off?" she asks him, and the witch only smiles, unknowing of the dark faerie who watches with a cheeky grin.

"I'm not bothered," he tells her honestly, but then Midnight takes her soft and small hands to wipe it off his face.

"Oh," she says, and she continues wiping his face. Unconsciously cupping his face, using her thumbs to wipe it away, and she sticks her tongue out in concentration. "I think... I think I made it worse. I'm sorry."

The witch only smiles, holding the hands of her face with his own, letting go of his staff for once, and he kisses them softly. "It's alright." And suddenly Midnight engulfs the witch in her dirty clothes, her arms finding their way to the broad of his back, lightly stroking.

"Thank you, witch," she murmurs, and the witch is stiff for a moment, before a big hand find its way to her back.

Then the witch wants her to hug him tighter, tighter, _tighter, please_. The witch nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck, glad when Midnight doesn't still or squirm uncomfortably. His hands wrap around her waist, leaving no inch of space between, and _oh god, I've been cold for so long_. And he is warm, he is oh-so warm.

Then he pulls back, aware of the lingering eyes of the creatures and people in the forest, and he is silent in his happiness. "Sometimes, I do wish you'd tell me what you're thinking, so I could understand you better," says Midnight wistfully, looking at those black eyes that hide all emotions between the phantom void of life and death. "But I suppose that makes you you. I suppose that makes you my odd, strange, sweet witch."

And then she leaves, playing with oblivious Jae-Ho, and he glares at a beaming Rèmy, but something echoes in his mind, in his heart, in his soul.

_My odd, strange, sweet witch._

My witch, she had said.

 _Her_ witch, he thinks.

So he smiles.

**A strange witch he is indeed, and he knows he doesn't deserve love.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sooooo... WE MEET SIX AND EIGHT?!?!? WOO-HOO!!!!!  
> We get Midnight hugging the witch?!?!?!?!? YAAAAAAAAAS!  
> We get mentions of Five X Eight?!?!?!?!? Will I give you a scene of Fatal Attraction as well? YES I FUCKING WILL!  
> Hope you enjoyed this chapter, I'm currently writing the next one!!!!!


	7. A Question Asked and Answered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Do you like me?"

**Chapter Six: The One Who Stole From The Witch's Garden - Part 6**

_"Do you like me?"_

_"너 나 좋아하니?"_

Midnight finds herself unable to sleep, something unsettling sitting at the very pit of her stomach, and despairing coils of inner turmoil twist inside of her. So, very cautiously she got up from the comfort of her bed, careful to not wake up Jae-Ho who lay in the bed beside her.

She looks back and forth between the fireplace inside and the lush gardens of outside, and she decides that the gardens seem nicer today. So she steps outside, barefoot. She finds herself going where she once sat with the witch when she first came, a bit outside the garden, where a primordial tree of tannin and aureate is, and there is a little swing that she sits on. She smiles slightly, her eyes landing on the roses and vine that slither all the way up the swing's handles.

Something had been gnawing and eating at her ever since she went to the forest a few nights ago. It has been eating her horribly from the inside, causing some form of anguishing pain in her mind. All her life she was taught that magical beings are... bad, that witches are evil and cruel. She had been taught this, had it instilled into her mind, engraved with a hot knife that magical beings are disgusting and wretched creatures. Yet, she finds herself doubting all her teachers words, she finds herself doubting Jae-Ho's words because ever since that day they went to the forest at night, the following weeks were only happiness in the forest.

Midnight would go everyday into the forest, not coming back into the witch's cottage for hours upon hours. Jae-Ho would tag along sometimes but he spent more time playing with the precious wolf. So Midnight would go, and she had made so many friends.

How could pixies be evil? How could the pixies that braid her with such precious care be evil? How could those pixies that hug her fingers and show her new things be evil? How could those centaurs be evil? How could the herd of centaurs that tell her stories and gallop around with her on their backs be evil? How could faeries and fairies be evil? How could Rèmy, the human-sized faerie, who helped her when she most needed it be evil? How could all the other faeries and fairies that fly around her head, twisting sweet flower crown to adorn her hair be evil?

How could sirens be evil? How could all those sirens who showed and gave her pretty things and chattered to her like old friends be evil? How could mermaids be evil? How could those majestic being who sang to her and made her laugh when she hurt herself be evil?

And all those other creatures had accepted Midnight as their own, one of them calling Midnight the 'Princess of the Forest', and then Rèmy had flicked the pixie and said, "I think you mean Queen of the Forest." How could any of these people, any of these beings, any of these 'monsters' be evil?

How could... how could the witch be evil?

Midnight doesn't believe it anymore, she knows Jae-Ho would be sad if she ever spoke aloud her thought of that the witch isn't evil, she knows, that's why she is silent. But the witch isn't evil, she now realises she knew that from the very beginning.

If the witch was evil why would all the ancient centaurs speak such high praises of him? Why would all the sirens giggle about how kind he was? Why would all the pixies look at him in such respect and admiration? Why would all the vampires and werewolves defend him when Jae-Ho spoke ill of the witch?

And she had seen it herself, how the witch cares in all those little ways. How he strokes the wolf's head in fondness, how his eyes twinkle when one of the faeries land on his head, how a little smile tugs up at the corner of his lips when Rèmy makes some stupid comment, how a little fond laugh bubbles in his throat when the sirens show a new shell they've found, how he looks at every living thing in the forest with such care and love. How he even looks at Jae-Ho – exasperated, annoyed yet understanding.

_"Why wouldn't he hate me?" said the witch to the dark faerie a few days ago, whilst he thought she slept. "I took away someone he loved, made her mine. Then I cursed him with pain for a whole night and scared his friend to death. It's only understandable, Rèmy. He's only caring for her, only doing what he thinks best. Should our positions have been switched, I would've done the same. Let him speak as much ill of me as he wants, penting up his anger will only hurt him."_

The witch is kind, the witch does understand, he just hides it behind a facade of gelid eyes and an emotionless face, to seem strong, to be a leader that is compassionate in his own ways. And the centaurs tell Midnight of a time where the witch would smile all the time but how that smile never reached his eyes after his brother died. _"Ever since you came along, he's been nothing but happy. That smile has finally returned, all thanks to you, young one."_

And she thinks of all the times she has spent with the witch so far. She thinks of the time where she had been a nervous, stammering mess beside the witch but he had only smiled and reassured her that he wouldn't touch her, not like that, not in anyway whatsoever. She thinks of the time where she saw him healing a broken branch on a tree, big hands wrapped around, whispering a little spell underneath his breath.

She remembers the time he showed her something magical – the aurora.

_"Come, I'd like to show you something," he says with a smile, holding out a gentle hand and Midnight takes it, and he pulls her upwards. "It's beautiful, I've been wanting to show you ever since you came, come on."_

_He holds her hand, stringing her alongside him, and she feels his hand settle on her waist. They weave through millions of ravishing trees, and they reach wherever the witch wants them to be... a rolling plane of hills, and the witch points up at the sky, and Midnight is absolutely shocked._

_The polar lights blossom in the night sky, rippling in a soothing rhythm of silk-green, magenta-pink and polar-white. The aurora sings a melodic, magnificent ballad in all its divine glory, an ancient alchemy. A joyful, dancing flame in the dark night sky that is littered with effulgent stars. The aurora is an arcipluvial heaven in the star-filled night, and Midnight could watch for infinity the serene lights that dance as if they were dreams set free._

_She looks at the witch, to see his mouth slightly agape and his eyes wide with wonder – childlike, almost. He looks at peace, and more prepossessing than all the stars in the world._

_"It's beautiful," she breathes out to him a while later, her voice a caramel blossom-sweet happiness. "Thank you for showing me this."_

_The witch only smiles and pulls her closer, so that her hands rest on his chest and her head on his shoulder, and she feels it his arms pulling her even closer and tighter, his head laid upon her own as they stay in the blissful havens._

"Are you alright, dearest jewel?" a voice snaps Midnight out of the memories she loves so much, and she looks up to see the very man she thinks of standing right in front of her, with a worried look in his dazzling eyes.

"Witch," she says but before she can stand up, the witch goes down on one knee, and takes her hand in both his own.

"What's wrong?" the witch asks. "You seem perplexed."

"Nothing's wrong." She smiles, and then her face rearranges into a curious expression. "Are you alright, witch? Can you not sleep? Is everything alright?"

The witch laughs lowly, and he says, "Everything is fine, Princess." His hands goes up to stroke her hair. "But it is because of you I woke up, Doll. I heard someone come outside and suspected that the thief may have tried to leave, but here you are, sitting on a swing."

"Is there something wrong?" he asks again. "You can tell me, if you trust me, that is."

"It's just that..." Midnight takes a deep breath. "This forest, these people... They aren't what I expected."

"Hmmm, all those stories you've heard must be different to what it is actually like." The witch smiles but it looks almost like a smirk. "Some people will say that we are cruel, that we are monsters. But we are monsters to them the way humans are to animals." Midnight frowns in confusion. "Think of it, precious jewel. Humans kill animals to eat, for survival. So, to animals, humans are monsters. We do what we do to survive, and the humans call it cruelty, call us 'animals' but the only animal that has ever displayed true cruelty is humanity itself."

The witch then adds, "As for the forest and the people, they really adore you, doll. Every single one of them." The witch laughs. "I went out this morning and I had all the pixies crowding me, asking if you had come with me, and I've never seen Belathazor and Adonia-" The centaurs, Midnight thinks- "talk so happily about someone." The witch then questions with a serious tone to his voice. "Don't you feel it, Midnight?"

"Feel what?"

"That you belong here." The witch stands up. "When you're done thinking, come back inside and sleep, I would hate for you to catch a cold."

The witch turns away with a smile, his eyes shining like stars in the night, and Midnight ignores the feeling of daunting and disdaining eyes boring into the back of her skull. Then Midnight calls out, "Witch?"

The witch freezes in his spot, and he turns to the side so that one side of his face is reflected by moonbeams and the other is cast darkly by the shadows. "Yes?" he says, and he moves his body so that he fully faces her.

"I have a question."

"Ask away, sweetest."

"Have you ever loved someone?" she asks hesitantly.

"I think I have, I think I do," the witch says. "To love, I think is the greatest power of all, and I am capable of it, I think. I have once loved, and I still do love." The witch smiles. "Does that answer your question, princess?"

"I... think so."

"You are truly stupid," spits the witch to Jae-Ho while Midnight sleeps, but mirth sparkles in his eyes.

"No, I'm not! How was I supposed to know that it was your blood? It looked like strawberry juice!" Jae-Ho tries to defend himself as his face burns magma-hot.

"Did it _taste_ like strawberry juice?" asks the witch, sarcasm dripping from his tone.

"I DON'T KNOW WHAT IT TASTED LIKE BUT IT DIDN'T TASTE LIKE BLOOD! I'M PROBABLY GOING TO DIE-"

"Ooh, what's going on here?" asks the dark faerie, somehow entering the house, and the witch looks at Jae-Ho like he should explain but Jae-Ho shakes his head, embarrassed down to his wits.

"The thief here saw a cup of my blood and thought it was strawberry juice and drank it," says the witch, and the dark faerie's laughter is almost instant, he doubles over laughing, falling onto the ground and pounding the floor.

"YOU- WHAT AN IDIOT- I CAN'T STOP- OH GOD, YOU'RE SO STUPID-"

"Hey," Jae-Ho whines. "He put in a fancy goblet! I thought it was juice!"

"Honey, that isn't even light enough to be strawberry juice," says the witch but a genuine smile decorates his face, and he ruffles Jae-ho's hair with a fond laugh, and for once, Jae-Ho doesn't mind the witch's touch. "If you'd like strawberry juice though-"

"Am I cursed now? Am I going to die?"

"My blood isn't cursed but it may make you oozy," says the witch. "It won't kill you, if it does, I'll just bring you back. I could remove it, if you'd like me to, but it would hurt slightly."

"... I'm fine, thanks," says Jae-Ho, and suddenly the witch doesn't look as monstrous as Jae-Ho thinks he is, maybe it's because for once there is no glare or unsaid threat hanging in the air, perhaps it's because he's looking at him the same way he looks at the trees in the forest: fondness.

"Ai, thief." The witch comes closer to Jae-Ho, and holds out a golden goblet. "Have some. And before you offend me by asking, I didn't poison it." The witch's eyes twinkle. "It's strawberry juice."

Jae-Ho pouts angrily, despising how he can't seem to look intimidating in front of the witch, and he takes the goblet off the witch's hand and slurps with big eyes on the sweet drink. "You remind me of my little brother," the witch says, and he places a kiss on Jae-Ho's hair, and Jae-Ho's eyes go as wide as saucers.

"I would like to be friends, Jae-Ho. We should cast this hate aside, it's pointless. I will give you everything you need, everything you want, I can promise you that. And if you trust me just enough. I think you will find your freedom and your happiness within this forest."

Jae-Ho is silent and the witch only smiles.

"Jae-Ho!" chatters Midnight. "After I help the witch, do you want to come into the forest with me?"

Jae-ho shakes his head exaggeratedly. "No," he whines. "I really don't understand why you want to talk to pixies and mermaids all the time."

"The witch told me there are dragons as well and-"

"HOW BIG IS THIS FOREST?!"

"Jimin-"

"WHOSE JIMIN?" screeches Jae-Ho, and Midnight laughs.

"Jimin is a siren, he's Taehyun's brother. He's also Rèmy's fiance. Well, he told me that this forest is practically endless, there is no end. Something to do with the witch's magic."

"Since you know so much, can you tell me why Nabi is always a wolf if he's supposed to be a werewolf? And-"

"The reason Nabi is stuck in wolf form is because he decided to somehow curse himself, and I'm making a potion to fix the problem. It takes a whole lunar phase to mature though." The witch comes out of nowhere and smiles at both of them. "Midnight dearest, I require your help outside. Also, thief, speaking of Nabi, he's asked for your presence where I last took you, and deliver this to the Pied Piper."

"When can I meet the Piper?" asks Midnight as the witch pulls her up, and Jae-ho places a quick kiss on Midnight's hair before he dashes out into the forest.

"Soon, most likely tonight," the witch tells her.

Midnight has her head laid on the witch's lap, the witch suggested this when she had said she felt tired, and the witch cards delicate fingers through her hair, occassionaly tucking a tendril of her hair behind her ear.

And he sings.

He sings a song of euphoric, melacholy love that ends in bittersweet tragedy. It's unheard and infinite, and the witch's dulcet voice slinks and tinkles in her ears as she listens to the song, the dawning chorus of birds twittering to join on, and the witch's song comes to a wavering end, and there is utter silence in the witch's garden.

Midnight feels the witch's hand moving from her hair to pick something up, and he motions for Midnight to sit up. "Do you feel better now?" asks the witch, and Midnight nods with a smile.

"Witch, Lydia tells me you're only a half-witch, is that true?" she asks him, drawing on the piece of parchment the witch had given her, and she remembers her foot-tall pixie friend with a precious and dainty face, her skin the colour of sizzling, woodland-green, and her tumbling auburn hair and gossamer wings, one of Midnight's first friends in the forest.

"... I've never comfirmed this rumour but I am for you," the witch tells her.

"What's your other half? Are you a fairy?"

The witch raises a brow questioningly. "Dearest Midnight, please don't tell me I look like a fairy. Fairies are beautiful creatures but they are... the size of my hand."

"Why is Rèmy so... tall then? He's almost as tall as you."

"Rèmy... Let me tell you a story, Princess. I think you know that I'm not from here, and I think you should know that other worlds with other beings do exist. I met Rèmy when I was about... fifty-years-old? I was quite young-"

"Young?!"

"I'm two thousand years old, what do you expect for me to think of so long ago? Also, I'm not even a legal adult where I'm from, so shush, and-"

"You're-"

"Stop interrupting me, precious jewel, I'm very tempted to shove a brick down your mouth so I can continue my story. Before you butt in, remember that I _will_ use your bones as my chopsticks if you talk anymore."

Midnight is silent.

"Good girl. Now, like I was saying, I met him at that age. I met him when some dryad queen was punishing him for absolutely nothing, so, I used my magic to turn stick-length Rèmy into human size whilst hiding behind the trees, and we don't call him the dark faerie for nothing. He used his dark magic to kill the queen, and ever since he's been what he says 'indebted' to me for saving his and his family's lives. There we are, that's the story. We've been best friends ever since."

"What about Nabi?"

The witch hesitates for a split second. "That's... I believe that's a story for another time. His story delves deeper into mine, and I don't like my past very much, dearest jewel." The witch looks guilty but Midnight places her hand on the witch's cheek, and the witch presses his face more into her palm. "Thank you."

It's silent for a moment. "What about your half? What are you?"

"Tch, you don't give up, do you?"

"Why do you hesitate to tell me?" she asks, tilting her head, and the witch only smiles.

"The more of myself I reveal, the more I feel vulnerable, but I suppose you are my strength, hence I will tell you. How can you be my strength if you don't know my weaknesses?" The witch sighs. "I am half-demon."

Midnight freezes. "A demon?"

"Yes, I can understand that you will think that I am cruel but please don't be sca-"

"You worry too much." Midnight grins. "You're only a demon, just don't sacrifice my soul or anything... Do you know Satan?"

"... I've never been to Hell, I would simply die."

"What do you mean?"

"Fire, it can kill me," the witch tells her casually.

It is silent, and Midnight feels the witch's hand entwine with her own, locking their fingers together, and the witch tugs Midnight closer towards him. "Witch? What else can you do? They never let us ask about magic back at the village, so...?"

"Come inside with me, and I will show you something I've made."

Midnight sits down on the witch's armchair, happily swinging on it whilst the witch goes to fetch something, and when he returns, Midnight's eyes go wide at the beauteous ring in the witch's hand.

The ring looks like it has been plucked out of the sky, and is made from a unknown white material, and it has runes carved onto it. The witch hands her the ring with a jewel of the most brilliant sapphire.

"It's beautiful," she manages to breathe out, awestruck, and the witch smiles. "What's it made of?"

"The gem is made from irises." Then the witch adds as a second thought, "As in the eyes."

Midnight drops the ring onto the floor at that, stunned and scared.

"It's pretty though, isn't it? I made it for you." the witch says while picking it up.

"I tend to make jewels and gems with pretty things like irises, blue irises are the only way to make things like this which is a sad preference of mine really. Siren's don't enjoy eating eyes, contrary to popular belief, so they give them to me, and bones are also useless to them. So I take them, make them into weapons for the centaurs and the 'metal' for the jewellery, like the one in your ring. Your ring is especially precious, I carved runes into it. It'll keep me with you forever, not like we aren't staying forever together anyway but still. Another gift from me to you."

The witch kisses her forehead and continues kneeling in front of her. He holds one of her hands with his, and uses the other to easily reach other things from the table.

He hands her another green jewel, spun from green irises. Colour after colour, object after object, every single one of them different from another.

Flat black created from pulling apart shadows.  
Grey created from the veins of the elderly.  
White created from the pureness of a child's soul.

"Don't cry dearest," the witch says as he wipes away her tears, Midnight hadn't realised she was crying until he had finished his show-and-tell of things. She quickly blinks away her tears and looks to the side. "Now, in return for all these secrets. I'd like to ask a question."

The witch traces a finger down the shadow of her jaw.

"Do you like me?" he asks, gaze intense and searching, and he repeats, "Do you like me?"

"Witch, I-"

"Because I like you so very much," he tells her. "I would burn God's very kingdom for you, Midnight. I will give you everything you could ever wish for, I will give you all my love, I will give you every piece of my body, my mind, my heart, my soul. It will, if it already doesn't, belong to you."

The witch strokes Midnight's face. "You asked me when we first met, what I would do for the love of my life, and I will answer that question now. I would do anything. I would destroy this entire forest, kill everyone I love if that is what you ask. I will tear apart my soul, hurt every being on this planet should they touch you."

The witch's face comes closer to her yet Midnight can't find herself pushing him away. "And if something stands in between us, tell me. Our bodies aren't strangers," he says, his voice ragged. "Our spirits aren't strangers. Tell me what part of me is stranger to you and I'll destroy that part of me."

Midnight can barely open her mouth, barely process anything that the witch has said, and the witch continues, "If it is Jae-Ho and your love for him that stands in our way, let me promise you this. Jae-Ho has already found his soulmate, the way I have found mine. The sad thing about when Nabi cursed himself is that he ended up suppressing the signal that tells his mate of their destiny together."

 _Jae-Ho is not mine_ , Midnight realises dully, _Just as I am not his_.

Yet this truth doesn't hurt Midnight very much, and no matter how much she will try to convince herself, she knows she can never run from the truth, from home.

"Midnight, I love you." The witch cups her jaw with one hand, stroking her cheek. "I promise you something. No harm will come to you, I won't let it. I'll let myself burn first. I'll let the world burn. But never you." The witch comes so incredibly close that Midnight can feel the ghost of his lips. "I will become a monster in your eyes, I will let you hate me as if it were me who is the cause of your pain... If it means you are safe, dearest jewel. I will keep this promise for as many eternities it takes."

Then his lips fall perfectly over hers.

The witch moves his satin-soft lips painfully slow against hers, and his lips captivate Midnight entirely. His lips are candied and dewy, intoxicating and potent as they capture her own lush, nougat-sweet ones. She feels it, every ounce of his moonlight pain and stardust heart, she can feel it as the witch pushes their lips together harder with a sultry, sensual movement of those lips Midnight found herself getting addicted to.

The witch pulls back for a second, to take a slight sip of breath, and he pushes his lips against hers again, moulding and sculpting them perfectly against hers. Midnight can feel him cupping her jaw, wiping away the last of her tears, and then the kiss becomes more bruising and burning; sending a wave of searing, scorching pain that is so pleasurable down to the pit of both their stomachs, and he tangles a hand in her hair.

The witch's lips are desperate and passionate against hers, and Midnight can barely feel anything but the plushness of his lips and the raw emotions he has stirred in her heart, and the taste of chocolate sponge and buttercream frosting drives her crazy. Then, the witch pulls away slowly, reluctantly, still chasing after the taste of her lips, still trying to hang on.

"Midnight," he rasps after a few moments of silence, forehead leaning against hers. "Open your eyes, please."

Midnight does and she looks at those enthralling eyes, and is silent.

"Midnight, do you like me?"

A moment of silence.

"I think I do."

"Nabi!" Jae-Ho yells as he feels the wolf pounce him as he enters their little hideout; a little cave illuminated by glowing fires and luminous lights, toasty warm, smelling like nectarine forest and Nabi's plush fur.

Nabi leaves licks all over Jae-Ho's face, and Jae-Ho doesn't really mind when the wolf even licks Jae-Ho's lips either. The wolf practically throws his arms around Jae-Ho, encasing him safely into those strong... arms?

Jae-Ho is fond of few things in the forest, one of them being the pixies who always help him around, the mermaids who had talked to him and understanding how they felt, and... Nabi. Nabi felt different to Jae-Ho. He knows that Nabi is actually a human who is currently trapped in wolf-form but that thought never really bothered Jae-Ho, instead he'd happily play chase with the wolf, let the wolf leap onto him and sleep in his lap.

He finds a consolence in the wolf's striking eyes that have hypnotised Jae-Ho so much, he finds himself entranced by the wolf's serene and tranquil nature, he finds an altruistic kindness in the wolf when the wolf comforts Jae-Ho silently, he finds himself captivated by everything this wolf has to offer.

"Hey! That tickles!" he giggles out, attempting to playfully push Nabi away from him, but Nabi simply nestles his snout into Jae-Ho's neck. "Ai, Nabi."

"How've you been?" he asks Nabi who gives a literal wolfish grin in response, and Jae-Ho bursts out cackling seeing the amount of effort Nabi had to put into that. "I'm taking it that means good," he says with a childlike voice, giggles still erupting from his throat.

"Nabi, when will you turn into human? I want to know what you look like? Are you short?" The wolf shakes his head. "Are you... Korean?" The wolf makes a half-and-half gesture. "Are you ugly?" The wolf growls and nudges Jae-Ho's head gently. "Well, I was gonna ask about your voice but I already know what that sounds like."

It was true, the witch told that Nabi could communicate with him telepathetically, but the witch has an odd, twisted smile on his face as he said it, and Jae-Ho had asked Nabi about it, and Nabi spoke in his head to prove the truth to him.

 _Of course you know that_ , the wolf says, and Jae-Ho could listen to that voice for eternity. A voice that contradicted Jae-Ho's cherubic one entirely. Nectareous, mellisonant and dulcet; rumbling like bottled thunder and raging storms, but as soft as shimmering sunsets and paradisiacal gardens of Eden, it was much higher than the witch's but still held the richness of a regal man.

"Nabi-ah, do you... Do you believe in soulmates?"

 _Yes_ , is all Nabi says.

"Have you met yours?"

_I just might have._

"Have you ever doubted your love for someone?" he asks, big eyes round and unsure.

_What do you mean?_

"Like... You've chased after someone all your life, all the time, and you finally get them, but then they don't feel... perfect?"

_Do you talk from personal experience?_

"Kind... of? This is... embarrassing." But Nabi encourages for Jae-Ho to continue. "Like, I've wanted Midnight for so long, you know? But then... I see her with the witch, with the people in the forest, and suddenly I don't think she's supposed to.... be with me. It's not like she ignores me, she talks to me for hours, she plays with me, she understands me, she kisses me but I don't feel the same anymore. I still feel that attachment and that love, but... not romantically? Ai, you must be-"

_She's found her soulmate, that's why._

"Wuh-what do you mean?"

_The Pied Piper could explain this better as he's had the same problem. He, too, once loved someone the way you do Midnight. But then he met the siren, he met Taehyun, and suddenly all that romance for that person left him. And the thing is... it doesn't feel devastating, it won't hurt and kill you, instead it will all just make sense._

"Buh-but, I'm not the one who has a soulmate? But... I don't feel hurt or devastated either, wuh-why wouldn't I feel hurt that Midnight... might love someone else? If I don't have a soulmate."

_Don't you?_

Jae-Ho is silent.

"Nabi-ah, have you met your soulmate?"

_I think I might've... Also, Jae-Ho, there are two types of soulmates in the world._

"Huh? What do you mean?" Jae-Ho looks hopeful and Nabi only looks at him with those docile eyes.

_There is one who will love you as if you are the sun, the moon, the galaxy. Think of it as romantic soulmates, called 'destined mates'. Then there is the second soulmate, the ones everybody meets first. The witch calls them 'Kindred-souls'. They are people who you click with, they are your best friend, they think with the same mind, and are the ones you run to when you're alone. They are the only ones who would never truly betray you, alongside your destined mate of course, and sometimes when kindred-souls meet before they meet their destined mates, they think it's love. I think... I think that's what you and Midnight are, Baby Blue._

Jae-Ho understands, he understands now. Kindred-souls – not destined mates – that's what he and Midnight are. _Oh_ , he thinks, and that's all it really is.

"Do you have a kindred-soul?" asks Jae-Ho oh-so quietly.

_Yes..._

"Whose yours?" he asks with a gentle smile, as he holds the wolf in his arms, but yet he feels the smaller one out of the two.

_The witch._

Jae-Ho's eyes go wide, and Nabi only laughs in response.

It stays silent in between them, and Jae-Ho can only stroke Nabi's fur as Nabi sleeps on his chest.

"Witch, can I not come?" Midnight asks as the witch leaves to go into the forest, saying he need to give Nabi the potion as it had fully matured. "Please," she says, making her eyes sparkle, and she can see the witch's internal battle.

"No, Dolly. Wolf transformations can be ugly, and I don't think Nabi would appreciate someone seeing him when he's naked." The witch laughs at Midnight's crestfallen face, and tilts her chin up so that her eyes meet his. "You bring back that pretty sparkle in your eyes, hmm? I'll be back soon, stay safe." Then he plants a chaste kiss on her lips making Midnight's eyes go rounded, and the witch only pinches her nose effectionately, and disappears into the dark night.

It's only a few moments later that she sees Jae-Ho coming back from the forest, and Midnight bounces as she embraces Jae-Ho into a hug. But then a thought crashes down on her uninvited, _I kissed the witch. What will he think of me?_

"Hey," he says, voice so very gentle and soothing, and worry flashes in his eyes. "What's wrong? Did he do something? Midnight, say something."

Silence.

"... He kissed me."

Jae-Ho's face falls.

"What... What do you mean?" he asks, hope glistening in his eyes but tears sparkle like gloss in those doe eyes. "Midnight, you're joking, right? You love me, ruh-right? Duh-did he force you? Please tell me you didn't kiss back, please."

"I... did but-"

"Why did you kiss him back?! Why didn't you push him away?!" Jae-Ho says, voice cracking in anger, and his eyes boil with fury and resentment – but not at Midnight, at the witch. "Midnight! Answer me!" He places his hands on Midnight's shoulder, Midnight who looks so panicked and frightened, and he gives her a shake. "MIDNIGHT!"

"I... Jae-Ho, I... I really... He said he... It felt... right?"

She expects one out of two reactions out of Jae-Ho. One being where Jae-Ho fumes in anger, plumes of hell-fire coming out of his mouth, and stomping into the forest to kill the witch. Two being where he cries his pretty eyes out, begging Midnight to not love the witch, and attempting to run away again.

But instead, he seems to calm down and his eyes flash with understanding, and Midnight can only feel confusion as Jae-Ho wraps his arms around her and pulls her close. She feels tears dripping onto the bare skin of her neck, yet she can only stammer out an apology, "Jae-Ho, I'm suh-sorry," she says, her voice guiltily quiet.

"No," he says. "Don't be. Don't be sorry."

He pulls away, and that same fierce look that Midnight loves so much glints in his eyes like smouldering Greek-fire. "I juh-just suppose it isn't meant to be, huh?" And he goes inside, leaving Midnight in the garden by herself.

**"I juh-just suppose it isn't meant to be, huh?"**

**Truly, it wasn't.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO A KISS WITH THE WITCH, KINDRED-SOULS AND A BIT OF WEREWOLF LOVE!


	8. Hell In The Forest, Another Witch and Death's Name

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Death smiles at her, showing off spellbinding, archangel-white teeth and an electrifying, boxy smile. His lips are cherry sweet, butter soft and the colour of cerise-pink. His face is handsome and stunning, with an adamantine jaw and strapping features. A strong, straight nose and skin the colour of gold and saffron; and wonderful, thick curls of Apollo-gold hair. His eyes are iridescent and beguiling loam-grey, a-glimmer with interest and kindness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You gon' like this one!

**Chapter Seven: The One Who Stole From The Witch's Garden - Part 7**

"People believe that he has a heart so cold that he could hold ice in his mouth and it would never melt, but behind the mask of ice he wears is a heart that beats fire."  
"사람들은 그가 입에 얼음을 담을 수있을 정도로 너무 차가워서 절대 녹지 않을 것이라고 믿지만 그가 쓴 얼음 마스크 뒤에는 불을 치는 심장이 있습니다."

**IT IS DEATHLY** silent between Midnight and Jae-Ho, and Jae-Ho keeps stealing glances at Midnight who stares out into space out the window. He can see the anxious little curve to her lip, the frazzled sparkle of her eyes, and the worrying fidgets of her hand.

"What's wrong?" he asks after an eternity's worth of silence, but he sees the glittering tears gathering up in Midnight's eyes. "Midnight, what's wrong?"

"I don't... know, there's something wrong. He should be back by now," says Midnight, and Jae-Ho knows that she talks of the witch. "He said he would be back till evening, it's almost midnight now, and... I think he feels distressed or... scared, something's wrong, Jae-Ho."

Jae-Ho goes, ignoring the clawing and gnawing fear inside his own heart as his guts twist painfully at a morbid thought in his head, and he ignores the call for help at the back of his head. He takes Midnight's wrist, gently pulling her away from the window, and he seats her down beside him in front of the fireplace. "Don't worry, I'm... I'm sure he's fine," he reassures her, and he wraps a delicate arm around her shoulders and pulls her to his chest. "Don't worry yourself, he'll be back soon."

Midnight, herself, feels unsure. She feels a torturing, aching pain but she can't scream out. A harrowing, stinging pain burns and scorches at her skin but she can't find herself moving as her skull pierces with agonising, undescribable pain. "Midnight!" exclaims Jae-Ho, as Midnight lets out a piercing, tormented scream of pain, clutching at her head and scratching at her skin. "MIDNIGHT! WHAT'S WRONG?"

Jae-Ho shakes Midnight who has precious tears rolling down her cheeks, and Jae-Ho can only look horrorstruck as she sees her beautiful, molten emerald turn the witch's obsidian black. Jae-Ho doesn't understand and his mind reels, and then when his and Midnight's eyes meet, her eyes go back to that wonderful green.

"Fire," she tells Jae-Ho, and Midnight's eyes look fearful. "There's fire, everywhere. The forest – The forest is on fire!"

 _Jae-Ho, do not let Midnight come out the cottage. It's too dangerous!_ says Nabi's voice in Jae-Ho's mind, and Jae-Ho throws his arms around Midnight's shoulders, Midnight who was already rushing out to the forest, and he can hear Midnight's desperate cries and pleads to let her go. _Don't let her go, the witch will kill us all if she comes after him._

"You can't!" he vociferates, struggling against Midnight's thrashing. "Nabi said so! He says it's too dangerous!" Then Jae-Ho lies, "And he said the witch is okay!"

"NABI'S LYING!" screeches Midnight. "HE'S FUCKING LYING! I saw it! THE WITCH'S HANDS WERE BURNING! HE'S DYING! YOU HAVE TO LET ME GO! JAE-HO! LET ME GO! PLEASE!" Midnight stars crying. "I duh-don't wanna lose him!" Yet Jae-Ho keeps his hold firm and strong, nails digging in Midnight's supple skin, and he wrenches her back from the door.

"MIDNIGHT! STOP!" he roars, and Midnight's goes frighteningly still. "That's not what the witch wants! Going there will only create more problems! Do you understand!?" Midnight nods after an aeon, but tears roll down her cheeks. "Good," he says quietly, setting her down, and he watches as Midnight curls up on herself, rocking back and forth.

Jae-Ho can feel it, the fear, and he can smell death and blood and fire in the air, yet he goes to Midnight and wraps arms around her, ignoring the excruciating pain he feels all over his body like white-hot needles, and he stays with her; silent, and sooner or later, they both fall asleep, tears streaking both their faces.

Fire. It's everywhere in the forest.

A marrow-burning orange fire, tearing through the enchanting beauty of the forest, ripping apart all of the entralling, bubbling sweetness of the forest. Unadulterated, monstrous flames – not like any other fire, a magical fire – devour the forest whole, dancing a dance without rhythm, without melody. The witch feels terror course through his blood as he looks at the blackened bodies, charred bones, and unsettled souls of all the creatures snatched before their time. He sees the trees, twining and moving, attempting to reach the sky with skeletal, deathly twigs weak from being set on fire, and he can feel the terrifying pain of every creature that has already died.

Fire has always had a transient beauty, its little ribbons of light licking away at the witch's beloved forest, and the witch screams at all the creatures to move away from the fires, to get out before it's too late. The fire outshines the stars tonight, and the witch can only roar and hiss at every creature to get away as he snarls a spell.

"Hyung!" screeches the Piper above the hollering screams of pixies and fairies, above the thundering hooves of centaurs who help all their other friends, grabbing them to get them out at the witch's orders. "Hyung! There's unknown creatures attacking the forest!"

The witch can only feel a silent, despairing dread punch him in the guts because this couldn't be, it shouldn't be possible, only another witch could create a fire so big, and he can see the fear in the Piper's innocent eyes. "Daehyeon! Get every fucking person out of here! I'll deal with it!" he tells the Piper, his heart wrenching backwards as he sees another pixie caught in the flames.

The witch runs, faster than a jagged wire of lightning, and he can feel Nabi running beside him, no longer stuck as a wolf. How could he not sense it? How could he not sense the fire before it got too big? How could he not sense another unknown presence in the forest? He knows it isn't the dragons, the dragons are too far away. He knows it couldn't have been any of the creatures in the forest. For once, his magic fails to make him see, too scared, too frightened, to properly see.

 _Coward._.. echoes his father's voice. _You're weak._

The witch shuts out those memories, locks them away in that dark curve of his mind, and his eyes rage as he looks at what has become of his home, of his people, and anger courses through him like a million knives. _They are not unknown creatures,_ the witch thinks, _they are spirits from the Cursed Realm, creating havoc in my home._

Spirits, evil spirits, are terrifying to fight, yet the witch fights every single one of them, ignoring Nabi's yells as he gets too close to the fire. He recognises everyone of these spirits, every single one of them somebody he had killed in the war so very long ago, yet he feels as if he's once again that young boy who killed an entire world of people just to protect that precious brother of his. He fights those spirits, annihilating them before they can even touch him, and his hands burn with magic, glowing brighter than the fore itself.

"Witch!" sneers a spirit, and the witch remembers him: Ghoultar. "You will pay for what you have done! And you will pay with your home! With that beloved girl!"

"We'll see," growls the witch, and he roars the shout of a warrior as he slices through the spirit with magic, spitting on what remains of the spirit, and an unpleasant smirk decorates his face as a horrific fut courses through him.

So he obliterates, destroys everything that dare touches what he loves so dearly. And when he sees Nabi struggling against a spirit too big, too huge, he is instant to stand in front of his kindred-soul, and Nabi watches in the amazment as he sees the witch conjure up a shield made of the cosmos and stars, and throw it into the spirit.

The witch looks at the forest that is glazed with gizzards, annointed with innards, and the sickly smell of wretched death rings the air, as do the shrills of spirits slashed away and pixies shrieking as spirits shoot them down with their shadow arrows. He blasts every spirit his eyes land on, his eyes glowing a piercing, icy-grey as he blesses dead creatures of his home with life again, and he throws them into a portal of safety.

He smiles slightly as he sees the Piper playing his music – a curse to all the poor spirits that wail, their hearts bloated with hatred for the beautiful music that the Piper plays, and he sees Taehyun – the siren – valiantly fighting all the spirits with the sword of the sun.

Vermillion glows like effulgent blood in the witch's hands, and the witch's eyes land on Rèmy; Rèmy, his best friend, with blood dripping out of a huge gash in his stomach, on his knees as a hooded spirit plunges a knife into his stomach. The witch shrieks and yells for his friend, and he feels a crippling wrath as he sees the same spirit wrench on Rèmy's wings, and the scream Rèmy lets out is bloodcurdling as he attempts to pull off the spirit, but the witch can hear the slight rip of Rèmy's wings.

The witch does a delicate twirl of his hand, his fingers crackling with black lightning as something scarlet shoots out at the spirit, yet the spirit is only thrown backwards, not disappearing like all the other spirits. The witch is quick to run to Rèmy and kneel beside him, and the witch's heart breaks as he hears his beloved friend's ragged and laboured breaths,

 _How did a spirit manage to beat a dark faerie?_ The witch decides to find out the answer to this question later, and the witch strokes Rèmy's hair as he places a hand on Rèmy's wings, but they're gone, ripped clean off, and the witch looks into Rèmy's eyes in horror.

"Take him," he says to Jimin, handing him the man who looks half-dead, and the witch can hear Rèmy's choked sobs and wails as he mourns for his beloved wings. "And run."

Resentment courses through the witch and everything almost goes blank as he demolishes and ruins every last of these accursed creatures, sending them back to their ill-omened land of rot. The witch can see nothing, feel nothing but loathing as he shoots jagged flames of magic at everything, creating intricate designs to torture the souls for eternity, and he sees all of them dying, and he thinks of everything in this forest that lives, and then comes the enigmatic spirit.

It's the spirit that ripped Rèmy's wings, yet there is no wraith glow coming out of the spirit, the spirit seems almost alive, yet the witch doesn't care, all he hears is a cacophony of nonsense as he feels the feral urge to kill, to kill and rip apart. The spirit turns around and for a second, everything goes silent as a ball of sizzling green forms in the witch's hands, and the witch freezes as he looks at the spirit.

"Yoongi?" he says, voice cracking, and he can hear Nabi's yelling for him to get out, but it seems faint, as if through a veil of water. "Little brother?"

Those eyes that glow crucifix-red and hair that mint-green, and he sees those lips curve into a malicious smile – it couldn't be Yoongi, couldn't be him. The witch feels tears come to his eyes because the spirit looked too much like his beloved little brother, and for a second, the spirit's smile morphs into that cute gummy smile the witch has missed so much. Then that disappears and the spirit puts his mask on, and... fades away.

Then reality comes crashing down on the witch as he fights off the last of the hellhounds, but then the ground starts quaking, rumbling as the forest starts losings its life. The witch bends down, digging his hands into the divine soil, and he screams in agony as he restores as much life as he can, and a scorching wave of magic goes over the forest. He takes out one hand from the forest's dirt and uses it while chanting a spell under his breath, and the fire begins to fade away from the trees. He sees all the dead creatures of the forest and his heart aches for them all. _I will bring them back_ , he promises silently.

"HYUNG!" he hears Nabi scream, and when the witch looks up, but it's too late as something pierces right through the witch's heart, and the witch turns to see the masked spirit – eyes flaming red. The witch can feel it, the forest's anger and rage, and the witch feels a horrifying pain rip through him as the spirit pulls out the sword that was embedded in his heart. "HYUNG!"

The witch's eyes meet Nabi's, and the message is clear: _Don't_.

The witch turns and a battle commences, as the witch whips out a weapons of unadulterated darkness, and the spirit throws balls of fire at the witch. Everything happens in a flash to the creatures of the forest, one second the witch was tearing apart the spirit, the next the witch is screaming in petrifying misery as fire sets itself on his body, and it is Rèmy who weakly banishes the spirit. Nabi is sprinting to the witch, and he can see the forest withering away, he can see all the magic fading as the saccharine streams turn to magma, as the primordial trees twist and turn, branches cracking and turning to dust. Everything starts fading away.

"Hyung! Save yourself!" he screeches, and he knows that the fire is eating at the witch on the inside, and Nabi's mind goes blank as he sees his beloved kindred-soul burning away, and something splashes over the witch: Water. And Nabi sees Taehyun who had thrown the last of the water onto the witch, and he sees everyone, all the creatures who had survived the attack run to the witch.

"Hyung!" he calls as he sees the witch lying on the forest ground. "Hyung-ah!"

The witch's entire body is burned and bleeding, and Nabi knows there is little chance that the witch is alive, but then the witch breathes – barely. The forest is withering, rotting, dying, and turning into smouldering magma, releasing dark magic into the air, and the forest creatures wail. They see it, all of them, they see the witch's fingers moving the slighest bit, and then magic crackles at them, and they all look with hope.

The witch mutters something, and the Piper hears, "Midnight," he cries, and with one last, wavering word, the witch breathes out, "Life." He lifts up his hand to touch the sky – burned hands, and a ball of magic shoots up into the sky, and Nabi screams as the witch chooses the life of the forest above his own. Everything starts restoring itself back to normal, the trees gain their branches – no longer charred and broken, instead healthy and divine, and the streams turn back into water, everything goes back to its enchanting nature.

And Nabi sees all the dead creatures fluttering their eyes open with a new life, and he curses at his kindred-soul who lays lifeless in front of him. The Piper is sobbing, tears streaming down his face as Rèmy falls to his knees, wailing for the witch to wake up. Nabi places a hand over the witch's heart, and he can feel the grief in the air, as Nabi feels himself breaking as brittle as caramel, and as he cries silently, he feels it. _Thud_ , goes the witch's heart, and after an eternity, _thud_.

"He's alive," he whispers and Rèmy's face looks at Nabi questioningly, tears of sorrow held in those pale-green eyes. "The other witch, the one we met when we got here," Nabi whispers again, a plan formulating in his head. Nabi stands up, and he shouts to the forest, "I will return, and I leave..." Nabi thinks. "I leave Midnight-Celestín Starwind in charge."

"Daehyeon, Taehyun, Rèmy." Nabi breathes hard as he thinks of the last thing he can do, out of desperation. "Take the witch back to the cottage, and keep him alive, Rèmy knows how to do it. I know who can help."

Midnight finds herself awaking, and she manages to untangle herself from Jae-Ho's hand, and she can feel something in the air. _Something isn't right_ , she thinks, and the door bursts open. She can feel Jae-Ho stirring next to her, and she sees him knuckling his eyes cutely as he gives a little pout at being awoken from his sleep. Midnight sees the Piper walk in first, and she feels horror looking at all the cuts and bruises over his body, and she sees Taehyun walking in as well – aubergine and crimson decorating his face and body. Then follows the other siren she had met – Jimin, a stunning man with plush cheeks and lush lips, but tears streak his face.

"What happened?" she asks, but horror strikes her harder than ever as she sees Rèmy walk in, covered head-to-toe in thick blood, and she sees the witch limp in his arms, and a little cry escapes her lips as she looks at the state of him.

Rèmy places the witch down, and terror strikes Midnight as she looks at the blood that flows out of Rèmy's back, and now she understands the mourning on Rèmy's face. She kneels next down to the sofa on which the witch lays, and tears gather in her eyes as she clasps a hand on her mouth, stifling her sobs, and she looks at the witch who is no longer recognisable.

His skin is dry and charred pitch-blank, and blood sticks to his face like goo. His body is in a gruesome, cruel position, the fire had smoked his skin, searing through it so that many cuts and gashes adorn him. Midnight finds herself breaking down, and she feels gentle hands on her waist, lifting her up, and she finds herself choking on incoherent words, as Jae-Ho takes her away from the body, and she slams herself into a hug as she cries into his chest.

"Wuh-what happened?" she asks, sobs wracking her body absolutely useless, and she looks at the Piper desperately for an answer. "Who duh-did that to him!?" The Piper's eyes only glisten with tears, and he comes over to Midnight, opening his arms for a hug, and Midnight runs to him, throwing her arms around the Piper whose hold is so warm. "Is he duh-dead?" she asks into the crook of the Piper's neck.

"Duh-don't think so," says the Piper brokenly, and she sees Taehyun looking at her with pain reflecting in his own eyes, and Midnight offers him to join the hug, and Taehyun embraces them both with lithe, svelte arms.

Midnight is still crying silently as she heads over to Rèmy, who mumbling ancient spells, and Midnight looks at his hands that have a black, glittering sand circling around them, and she realises that Rèmy is helping the witch. "Don't disturb him," says a quiet voice from behind her, and she sees Jimin looking at her, his hand on her shoulder and he pulls her away from Rèmy. "Rèmy's the only thing keeping him alive right now, his dark magic is helping the witch," explains Jimin gently. "We can't talk right now, it'll disturb him, Rèmy's already weak, so I'll explain later."

Midnight can only nod and go back to the comfort of Jae-Ho's arms, but she aches to go hold the witch as well, but she stays with Jae-Ho who sits on the floor, cross-legged, holding Midnight in his arms, singing a lullaby gently as tears silently go down her cheeks. She sees Jae-Ho stiffen as the Piper also wraps his arms around them and when Taehyun does the same, but Jae-Ho continues his singing, and puts a gentle hand on Daehyeon's hair, and he does his best to stroke Taehyun's cheek comfortingly. Midnight sees Jimin who has for hours had a hand set on Rèmy's shoulder, and he can hear Jimin whisper something sweetly to Rèmy who continues his chanting, and she sees that Jimin has bandaged him all up.

It's when the light of day seeps in again that Rèmy finally stops, and the witch is breathing hollowy and wispy, but still breathing, and some of his wounds have been closed. Rèmy stands and everyone else instantly follows, tear stains on all their faces, and Midnight sniffles as she tries to go closer to the witch, but Rèmy stops her by wrapping a hand around her elbow, and pulls her away. "We mustn't make him stir, he could die," he tells her.

"Is he going to be okay, hyung?" asks the Piper after an eon, chocolate eyes looking hopeful as he asks Rèmy the question.

"For now," breathes Rèmy, and Midnight can see the struggle for Rèmy to even breathe right now, and dark shadows hang underneath his eyes. "I am weak, which means so is my magic. I can only do so much, Daehyeon."

"Daehyeon?" questions Jae-Ho, as he strokes Midnight's hair.

"My name," says the Piper serenly, then he turns to look at Rèmy. "What is Nabi hyung gonna do?"

"I... think he's going to go... I don't know, Daehyeon, I really don't." Rèmy groans as he attempts to breathe properly, and Midnight puts a hand on Rèmy's head lovingly, ignoring the stinging pain in her heart, and for some reason, Rèmy relaxes.

"You need to rest," says Midnight. "There are rooms upstairs, Jimin can take you. If anything happens, I'll tell you, don't worry." She ushers Jimin and Rèmy upstairs, but not before Jimin tells the Piper to explain to them. "Go on, we'll be alright."

Midnight wipes away the tears in her eyes again as she sees how gently Jimin coaxes Rèmy upstairs, placing kisses on his cheek everytime he manages to get up a step. And Midnight sits down again, beside Jae-Ho who holds her hand in reassurement, and in front of Midnight's eyes keeps flashing the witch's burned body. "What happened?" asks Jae-Ho.

"We... I... Spirits from the Cursed Realm, they... We don't know how... But they got in somehow, and they set fire tuh-to the forest. They killed so many of... everything," says Daehyeon, and Midnight can see the flashes of memory in his eyes, and she reaches out a hand to comfort him. "And." Daehyeon chokes on his tears, and Taehyun tenderly wipes away those tears, and places a warm kiss on Daehyeon's lips, and Jae-Ho's eyes go wide. "And, we were all fighting all the spirits, every single creature fought against them, but all of us combined aren't struh-strong as witch hyung. So, he kuh-came and started destroying them all. Wuh-one of them ripped off Rèmy's wings."

Daehyeon sniffles, and Taehyun continues for him, his own voice pained and broken. "The witch started res-restoring the forest because it was withering, and he removed all-all the... the fires. That sent the first wave of muh-magic. You must've felt that. Buh-but then a spirit stabbed him through the heart, it duh-didn't kill him buh-but it hurt him. It happened so quickly, they-they were fighting but the wuh-witch was hesitating, I dunno why, and then... then, he, em, the spirit set him on fire, and I think it was Rèmy who banished the spirit."

Taehyun places another manna-sweet kiss against Daehyeon's lips, wiping away Daehyeon's tears as he does so, and the kiss lasts a bit longer as Daehyeon seems to latch himself onto Taehyun. Daehyeon lays his head against Taehyun's shoulder, and Midnight can only smile sadly as she sees the pure love between them. Taehyun kisses Daehyeon's temple again, and continues, "And I threw water on him to stop the fire, and uh... The forest really started fading away."

"Why?" asks Jae-Ho.

"The forest reflects the witch. The witch created this forest long before I was born, and when the witch is angry, so is the forest. When the witch is sad, so is the forest. When the witch is dead... The forest will die, too." Taehyun sighs. "You must've felt the second wave as well. The witch used the last of his life, the last of his power to restore the forest and all the dead creatures, and he called for you as wuh-well."

"He..." Midnight's eyes well up with tears with again, and she wonders how much she will cry today. "I shuh-should've been there."

"Nabi told me not to let you go," says Jae-Ho, and Daehyeon looks at Jae-Ho oddly.

"How did he tell you that? He was with us."

"In my head?" says Jae-Ho, and he looks at Midnight unsurely. "Isn't... that what he normally does?"

Taehyun and Daehyeon both start giggling sweetly. "Looks like somebody found their soulmate," sings Taehyun, and Daehyeon echoes those words, and Midnight claps excitedly, finding herself happy with the lighter atmosphere. "You found your soulmate and you didn't even realise," snickers Daehyeon.

"Don't be mean, honey," says Taehyun. "It was most likely because Nabi was suppressed in his wolf form, remember that," he says while he pokes the tip of Daehyeon's nose.

"Also," says Daehyeon to Midnight, suddenly remembering something. "Nabi hyung put you in charge whilst he was gone."

"Oh," is all Midnight says. "Then I should go check on everyone in the forest, shouldn't I?" Midnight places a soft kiss on Jae-Ho's cheek, and she holds Daehyeon and Taehyun's hands comfortingly. "Thank you," she says and both men look equally confused but Midnight only smiles lightly, hiding the sad sparkle in her eyes. "I'll be back soon."

Midnight wears a cloak – the witch's cloak, and looks longingly where the witch's body lay, and leaves. "I suppose she doesn't want to stay here," says Daehyeon with a sigh, his own eyes downcast and gloomy, and his usual enchanting voice has a sepulchre desolance to it. "I mean, I guess staying here might make her sad?"

Jae-Ho, himself, is still dwelling on the fact that Nabi could be his soulmate. Could it be true? Could that green-eyed wolf be his soulmate? Is that why this invisible connection had stringed them together? Is that why Jae-Ho had so freely spilled out every thought and worry to the stranger wolf? Is that why-

"Are you alright, Jae-Ho?" asks Daehyeon, whilst Taehyun sleeps in the Piper's lap.

"Yes... I'm fine," says Jae-Ho. "You? It must've been scary seeing everything go away like that."

It was odd, talking to the people he had once been so terrified of.

"Yeah... It made me really sad because I almost lost my family, my home-" Tears gather in his eyes whilst he talks- "and I'm scared that witch hyung might... y'know, die..."

"Everyone seems really... fond of the witch," says Jae-Ho aloud without thinking.

"Why wouldn't we be? How could we not be fond of him?" The Piper laughs in memory. "I remember when I first met him, I was scared, scared as hell, and I was a child. But he held my hand and told me everything was going to be alright, that nobody would hurt me anymore, and I trusted him, and I still do! He's the sweetest! Right, Taehyunnie?"

"Yes!" Taehyun plays with one of Daehyeon's curls.

"Do you guys know the witch's name?"

"No," says Daehyeon. "Rèmy and Nabi know."

The atmosphere shifts again, despairing and sombre, a melancholy song coming out of the Piper's lips as they all attempt to soothe the witch whose gashes suddenly burst open, and terrifying, gruesome wails leave his closed mouth.

"His spirit is in pain!" cries Rèmy as magic circles his hands, but sheer panic clouds his eyes as blood blossoms like roses in the witch's agony. Taehyun is crying, held back by Jae-ho who holds Taehyun to his chest, and the Piper seems to be doing his best to use the magic of his music to help, but it doesn't work, nothing works, and the witch is going to die all over again.

"What's going on!?" asks Midnight as she enters after hours upon checking the forest and all its inhabitants, comforting all the sad souls whilst ignoring her own. "What happened to-"

The door opens again, yet this time a different presence enters. Three presences so powerful and intimidating that Midnight almost recoils at the intensity of their stares, almost matching the witch's own regal and commanding presence, and for a second everybody stares at these three men. The first one is much taller than the other two, with brilliant, deep green eyes the colour of beryl. His skin is of umber and almond, smooth as porcelain, a crimson shade blushing over his cheeks, and his hair is the colour of plum purple, and Jae-Ho swears he recognises him, alongside the euphoric string that seems to tug at him.

The second one is a man with a gentle and small face, his skin is pearl-white and fair, he has dark hair and darker eyes to match. A gentle smile adorns his face despite the horrific picture in front of him, svelte, treacle-sweet lips form a look of understanding, as his eyes meet Midnight's eyes. The third man's face is concealed by a mask of bone.

"Witch," speaks Rèmy, looking directly at the second man, eyes gleeful with hope. _Another witch?_ says the look on both Jae-Ho and Midnight's face. "Death," he greets to the bone-masked man.

"Hello, Rèmy. Long time, no see," says the new witch with a mellifious and creamy voice, smooth as velvet. "Ah, I see the problem," he says, looking where Midnight attempts to soothe the witch's shaking body. "Stuck in memories formed in Hell, stuck in the throes of agony from so long ago..." The witch looks at them with a gentle smile. "I can save him, just give me some time." He stalks towards Midnight. "For now, child, you can leave me with him. He will be alright, I promise." The new witch puts a comforting hand on Midnight's hair, helping her stand up. "Don't cry." He smiles. 

"We'll give you space," says the purple-haired man, and Midnight instantly recognises him as Nabi – Nabi's own eyes seem pained and tormented, torn apart by the pain of his kindred-soul. "Everyone let's go upstairs."

Rèmy begins to take them all upstairs but Midnight decides to sit in the gardens instead, and Jae-Ho looks at her worriedly but she only smiles in response. Her ears tearing apart at the sound of the witch's sorrowful wails, and she steps outside into the gardens – wishing the best for him.

All of them are put into seperate rooms, but Jae-Ho feels someone's hand wrap around his wrist, and his skin burns and tingles pleasantly, and electric shock goes down his ear canals to his spinal column as he hears a tangy voice speak, "Jae-Ho, my love, come with me."

Jae-Ho turns around and he is pulled into a room, and his eyes widen as he sees green eyes looking right down at him, and pink dusts his cheeks pleasantly. He finds himself looking down, too embarrassed to meet eyes with his supposed fated soulmate, and he finds Nabi's scent driving him crazy.

Then Nabi smiles – breathtaking and gorgeous, dimples popping, and Jae-Ho can't help but marvel through languid lashes how beautiful Nabi is. "You're... Wow," is all Nabi can say, and Jae-Ho hides his face in his hands. Nabi laughs – a mature and sonorous sound, serene in the comfortable silence. "You're so beautiful."

"Nnn... Duh-don't say stuff like that," says Jae-Ho, already flustered.

"Hmmm, Baby Blue is shy, I hadn't expected that." Nabi laughs again, placing a kiss on Jae-Ho's nose, and Jae-Ho giggles at the ticklish gesture. "The witch is right, you are quite cute when you've got your guard down."

"I'm a man-"

"And I'm a werewolf," says Nabi with a gentle smile. "Also, you being a man has nothing to do with being cute." Nabi strokes Jae-Ho's cheek tenderly. "I've waited such a long time for you, you've been gone for so long." And his thumb strokes his bottom lip, and his eyes stare there for a while, and then he begins to lean in.

And Jae-Ho lets him, with no fear, with no hesitation, and suddenly he understands Midnight's words. Nabi's lips mould perfectly onto his, and Nabi uses one hand to cup his jaw, and the other to tangle in his hair.

The kiss is amorous and fervent, burning with a euphoric and felicity-like feeling, and Jae-Ho clings onto Nabi's shoulders as Nabi's addictive lips raided his, and the entire world around them became meaningless. Nabi could feel Jae-Ho's fluttering, butterfly heart against his chest, and he smiles against Jae-Ho's lips. Jae-Ho, himself, wholeheartedly enjoys Nabi's taste of peach, cream and apple, finding it intoxicating and exotic, and he his entire being burns as Nabi's mouth roams his. Then his stupid, _stupid_ lungs need to breathe, and Jae-Ho has no choice but to pull back, but not entirely. He keeps their foreheads interlocked and hot breaths escape his swollen lips, and he hears Nabi's throaty laugh.

"Oh, darling," he cooes, and places a chaste kiss against his cheeks, but before Nabi can say anything else, they hear hushed giggling come from behind the wardrobe, and Nabi sighs.

"I hate them so much," he whispers to Jae-Ho, striding away with a straight posture, and he drags out two beings from behind the wardrobe: Daehyeon and Taehyun, and Jae-Ho finds himself scorching out of shyness.

"You kissed him!" exclaims Taehyun, small waving about joyfully.

"And you technically just met!" adds Daehyeon with a jovial giggle.

"Yes, yes I did, and get out," says Nabi, shoving both laughing men out of the room. "Sorry about them," says Nabi with a sheepish smile. "They've been wanting me to kiss you for quite some time now."

Midnight stands outside in the garden, a biting breeze stinging her cheeks, and she wrings her hands nervously, the witch's wails still tormenting her, and she almost screams as she feels an unfamiliar hand on her shoulder.

She looks to the side and she sees the bone-maskes man looking at her, and she smiles – dazzling and charming as she looks at him. The man reaches up to remove his mask, with pretty-knuckled fingers he delicately takes off the mask to reveal a sublime man – and now Midnight's facing the Grim Reaper himself. Death was not what Midnight expected him to be. She had expected a cruel-looking man with two pools of cauldron-black eyes; passionless, merciless and emotionless. She had expected a lopside grin, with teeth tinted with blood, but that's not what she got.

Death smiles at her, showing off spellbinding, archangel-white teeth and an electrifying, boxy smile. His lips are cherry sweet, butter soft and the colour of cerise-pink. His face is handsome and stunning, with an adamantine jaw and strapping features. A strong, straight nose and skin the colour of gold and saffron; and wonderful, thick curls of Apollo-gold hair. His eyes are iridescent and beguiling loam-grey, a-glimmer with interest and kindness.

"Hello," he says with citrus-rich voice, his voice echoing in the forest, and a little chill settles itself deep in Midnight's heart as she listens to the man's honeycombed tongue. "I am Death, also known as The Soul-Archer, but my name is Taehyung." Ah, so Death has a name. "It's been quite sometime I've come to this forest." Taehyung comes to stand next to Midnight, and he turns to look at her with a gentle smile. "Who are you?"

Midnight looks at Death's serene eyes, and smiles. "I'm Midnight." Then she adds, "Midnight-Celestín Starwind, if you want my full name."

"Hello, Midnight," says Death with a laugh, his laugh also richly deep. "Well then, Midnight, would you like to take a walk with me through the forest?"

"Okay," she says, and she takes the hand that Death offers her. Their walk begins in silence, yet it's more comforting than words could bear, and Midnight finds a safety within Death's hands.

"Midnight-ah, I am hoping that you could explain something to me?" says Death, and Midnight nods and smiles for him to continue. "This forest shouldn't be so healthy and happy, it shouldn't be because of the witch's position. Yet I am sensing that you are his soulmate, but you are human, so you shouldn't be able to keep the forest alive but I sense that it is you and only you who is keeping the forest alive, so I wonder... Are you magical? I believe I already know the answer but I'd like to hear from you."

Midnight blanches, blinking profusedly. "I believe I'm fully human...? I don't think I'm a centaur or anything... Am I a centaur? No, I don't think I am." Then Midnight asks, "What do you mean by I'm keeping the forest alive?"

"Oh, you don't even know that you're doing it!" Death laughs out. "Everybody has their very own distinct soul, and as Death, I can sense that. And if you are magical, I can sense what your magic fills, like this forest is filled with the witch's magic and the witch's soul. Yet, your soul is also helping the forest stay alive and with the current condition of the witch, I don't understand how this forest isn't dead, let alone how it still seems to glow."

"But... I'm not magical?" says Midnight, and it comes out more like a question.

"I think you just might be, do you know who your parents were?" asks Death.

"I never knew my parents, not for very long anyways, I've been alone as a child, they left quite sometime ago," Midnight tells him. "I was raised by Jae-Ho's parents, and they're gone too."

"Why would a king abandon his own child?" wonders Death aloud, and Midnight looks at him with big eyes.

"A king?" stammers Midnight. "What do you mean a king?"

"Your father, you mustn't want to remember that place because... He hurt you, didn't he? Kept you locked away in that cold, little room, but you don't remember because you don't want to. Rèmy saved you from there, didn't he? Saved you from that awful nightmare, and you haven't told anyone, just Jae-Ho. What-"

"How do you know all this?" asks Midnight, those wretched memories swirling in her mind, worse than divine and unholy darkness. "How-"

"I am Death, I can see, I can see what you can't. I know all your secrets, and truly Midnight, don't be embarrassed for why he hated you so much. He was embarrassed for himself, if you'd like, I'll tell you what you want to know." Midnight nods, and Death continues, "Your father was embarrassed of himself, truly embarrassed. To rape a magical being, keep her chained and tortured, enslave her as she bore his first child, and kill her when his child was born, is evil, and then to call yourself a king, is definitely a thing to be embarrassed of." Death gives a barking, foul laugh, his own lips sneering in disgust as he talks of this cruel king.

Midnight can only feel sadness wash over her as she thinks of a woman, her own mother, killed, raped, and tortured by her own father. Tears stay unshed in her eyes, glistening like berries and dewdrops, and she asks, her voice cracking painfully as she does so, "What was she like?"

"Your mother was a dark faerie, like Rèmy, and Rèmy was her friend, hence he knew her, and that's why he took care of you unknowing that you were the witch's soulmate. And your mother was truly a remarkable woman, and she loved you very much. She was silent as snow, but she was as warm as the sun, loving everything and everyone, and I remember when I was a child she had held me and loved me, despite me being labelled a 'monster'. And when I walked her from the gateway to life and death, she still laughed and smiled, and she asked me to watch over you, and I have and will continue to do so."

Midnight is silent and she sees Death's eyes go the colour of a tempting oxblood, and Death encages her in warm and soothing hold. "Is she okay now?" asks Midnight. "Is she happier?"

"Hmmm, I think she is happy. I will check for you when I leave, and I might even return with a message." Death smiles as he strokes her hair comfortingly. "You're like her by the way. The same strong spirit, the same love and acceptance, the very same face yet your eyes are green, hers were brown..." Then Death adds with a laugh, "She was much taller than you. She was around a wonderful five foot ten, you are... five foot two, to my elbows."

Midnight removes her arms from Death who looks at her with a warm, brotherly look in his eyes, and he smiles at her boxily again. "So... I'm a dark faerie?" questions Midnight a bit later on.

"Since you are only half, you may not have some of the physical attributes, but you should ask your witch, he will know what I talk of."

"So... he knows? About my... past?"

"Oh no," says Death, a dark and grim look on his face. "If he finds out he will destroy your father's entire kingdom, if not that, he will give the same fate he gave to Hoseok to your father, most likely worse. And if he does know, then he's done very well at not doing anything."

There is some silence as Death watches Midnight help some of the pixies, and once Midnight is done, she asks Death, "How well do you know the witch?"

"If I were to say personally, no, I do not know him. If it weren't for my powers to see, then I know nothing except the stories that have been told and spread by tongue. All I know that he is a brave warrior, a fierce lover, a loving brother, and an amazing friend, but I have never been able to see truly into his mind." Taehyung adds, "I remember fighting in the war so man centuries ago with him, and to see a soul so filled with raw power was inspiring, and his late brother – Yoongi – as well, both of them were valliant and bonefide soldiers."

"A war?"

"Oh, there was a war centuries ago, it was very literally light versus dark. Thankfully, the side of Light won, but it wouldn't have been if it weren't for the witch and his brother. He's a hero." Midnight feels herself swell with pride and adoration for the witch, but then she asks, 

"The witch's brother... Could you tell me about him? I don't want to make the witch sad by asking."

"If it were you who was asking, I think he'd tell you. But, so will I. Yoongi... His name was Yoongi, I can't say too much without revealing too much, but Yoongi was a pure soul, innocent and sweet, he was quite reserved and clinged to the witch for comfort and love. He also loved Rèmy, considering they were kindred-souls, and Yoongi was quite... dramatic and funny, he enjoyed making people laugh by adding a stupid comment in, yet he was also filled with rage and resentent for those who hurt the witch. Yoongi... When he died... Could I tell you something?"

"Of course."

"Yoongi's spirit, his soul, when I came to collect his soul after his unfortunate death... I couldn't find him... I couldn't, but it was clear that he was dead, but his spirit, his soul never crossed the pathway... I don't know where Yoongi is, for once in my life, I am blind, and I cannot tell the witch, my own hyung, because... But, if you sense a spirit, sense lingering eyes and haunting words, tell me."

(Truly, Death is weak.)  
(Can't find a meager spirit, can't find a lost soul.)  
(What will become of everything?)

Death looks at the sky, where the flaming sun dips below the horizon.

"I think it's time we go back, don't you think?"

Midnight watches, her eyes sparkling with joyful tears, her hands clasped in front of her smiling mouth as she looks at the witch, her witch, who lay there, sound asleep and peacful; no more charred bones sticking out of sickly wounds, no more sticky blood that seeped like a crimson waterfall; no more burnt skin that is lubricated with layers of gut and ruin. It's just the witch with his white fondant skin, cherry-red lips and ebony-black hair, no scars on his face, but even if there were, Midnight would've thought him the most beautiful man of all.

"Thank you," she says to Seokjin – the other witch, the one who made this all possible, and she practically jumps on Seokjin. "What could I give you, Seokjin? I'll give anything!" she exclaims to the plump-lipped man who smiles delightfully.

"I don't take payment for helping a friend, also, En-" Seokjin quickly catches himself- "Your witch saved my life many times, and took nothing. But, I would like to spend time with you!" says Seokjin, pinching Midnight's nose in a playful fondness. "Since you're my friend's soulmate, I'd like to get to know you, but before we do that... Midnight-ah, is there anything else you'd like me to do?"

Midnight thinks. "Rèmy, his wings, they got torn off, could you...?"

"Fix them?" finishes Seokjin, and he sighs. "Unfortunately, that is not my type of magic. I'm afraid that the last time I attempted to fix wings that big, I ended up creating a titanic wing bone and no wings. Also... I cannot fix Rèmy's wings as they can't be fixed. It's not possible."

Midnight can only feel downright sadness because... Rèmy treasured his wings, very much, and now he... "But your witch might be able to do it."

"Oh... okay." Then a sudden thought enters Midnight's head uninvited. "Seokjin-ah, you're a witch, but-"

"-You're allowed to say my name?" finishes Seokjin with a brow raised in question. "I, myself, am not like your witch, I don't have a forest to take care of, I only have my brother Taehyung, and unlike other witches, I am a Bailiff, a protector of the realms. So, I'm quite alright, but your witch should be careful, that's why I told him to hide his name when he was banished here. To know a witch's name can be dangerous sometimes."

 _Banishment?_ wonders Midnight.

"I would usually stay, but there's a problem back at my home, I hope you understand, little dragon," tells Seokjin, eyes twinkling as he ruffles Midnight's hair, and Midnight nods in understanding.

Then she throws her arms around Seokjin, and squeezes him tight, pouring all the warm affection and soul-nourishing thankfullness into this hug, and Seokjin freezes for a moment before returning the hug with a squeaky, chiming laugh.

"What a sweet girl," she hears him say to Taehyung as they depart, and the last thing she sees of Taehyung is his wink as he disppears in a cloud of black smoke.

**Death is kind.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LOTS OF SHIT GOING ON IN THIS CHAPTER, SO LET'S GO THROUGH IT!
> 
> The appearance of Taehyung and Seokjin  
> Nine and Zero (SHIP NAME: JABI) kissing!  
> Some cute Daehyeon X Taehyun going on  
> Rèmy gets his wings torn off  
> Yoongi is Rèmy's kindred-soul  
> Midnight's mother was raped, tortured and enslaved  
> Enzo got burned alive  
> Midnight is also part dark faerie
> 
> Please tell me this isn't cliche. LMAO, EVEN IF IT'S CLICHE AND CHEESY, I DON'T CARE, I LIKE IT AND THAT'S THAT!


End file.
